Google's ARDA retinal AI passes one million patients screened

Google's Automated Retinal Disease Assessment tool has been used on more than one million patients across India, Thailand and Australia, according to a Comment in Nature Medicine dated 23 September 2026 by Richa Tiwari of Google, Paisan Ruamviboonsuk of Rajavithi Hospital in Bangkok, and Angus Turner of the Lions Eye Institute in Western Australia.

The anchor sites are Aravind Eye Care System in Madurai, Rajavithi Hospital in Bangkok, and Lions Outback Vision at the Lions Eye Institute in Nedlands. 'Scaling a successful deep learning tool across three highly distinct settings – in India, Thailand and Australia, offers cross-cutting insights that may inform the expansion of healthcare artificial intelligence globally,' the authors write.

Google does not run the screenings itself. It licenses ARDA to three commercial partners (Forus Health, AuroLab and Perceptra), and the services are offered at no cost to patients. The stated target is six million AI-assisted screenings across India and Thailand within ten years, up from the 600,000-plus screenings completed globally as of October 2024.

Ruamviboonsuk discloses consulting relationships with Roche, Biocon Biologics, Abbott, 4DMT and Bayer.