I recently saw a Samsung commercial where AI was being used to perform various tasks. There was a man working on a tablet, drawing what looked like a tattoo. The video then pans out and there is woman laying in a chair while a machine tattoos to the flow of the mans stylus. I was starstruck by this.
So what incredible things can A.I. do in the medical field? Well some Chinese physicians suggest that A.I systems have been successful in pinpointing common illnesses and diseases after they used the information of 60,000 patients to have the system analyze their data. In China however, because of their privacy laws it is easier for companies and hospitals to collect this data.
However, on Monday President Trump signed an executive order that could help the advancement of A.I. here in the U.S. Unlike China, gathering health data is a difficult task here in the U.S because there are different systems used in different establishments and organizations. Scientist are using something called neutral networks, that works by gathering all information fed to it and analyzing its data. These systems have been tested to diagnose certain illnesses, from asthma to diabetic blindness. The system has proven to catch illnesses that have gone undetected by doctors. Many believe this software will rival an experience physician.
Google is currently running clinical trials of an eye-scan system in India. If these systems become regularly used in the medical field do you believe there will be a fluctuation in employment? Whether it is in the medical field or in the engineering field.
Here is the article I read about this: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/11/health/artificial-intelligence-medical-diagnosis.html
Is programmed bedside manner as good as the "natural" kind? I don't think I'm ready for an autonomous AI doc, no matter how well designed. Call me Ned Ludd.
ReplyDeleteThat’s funny! And I don’t doubt there’s a possibility of that in the far future but for now, they’re looking more at machines programmed to be able to determine certain illnesses. They would be aiding doctors rather than replacing them for now.
DeleteJust while reading this article, it almost felt like I was reading a piece of science fiction. The fact that we are currently testing robotic diagnostics in medicine is simply baffling, and is equally amazing. With all the recent advancements and implementations specifically of AI, it seems like our technology is advancing faster than we know what to do with it! That being said, I think that approaching the age of robotic medicine with an air of caution is undeniably necessary, but if done correctly, it could revolutionize the medical industry for the greater good.
ReplyDeleteImplementing robots who can diagnose disease into the regular workforce has its obvious benefits, which can both be imagined and have already started to be scientifically proven. According to the NYT article, AI were able to accurately diagnose asthma and gastrointestinal disease more efficiently than the average doctor. This is something that can't go unnoticed, considering that a robot is infinitely more reliable to work than a human being, which means it is entirely possible that this will become a common practice in our near future. Relying on artificial intelligence, which learns exclusively from data from previous experiences as opposed to emotion (presumably), would in theory completely eliminate bias in the diagnostic process. Unless, of course, there was still some human interaction between the recording of symptoms and analysis of said symptoms, perhaps in the data entry phase. However, if the AI was capable of collecting data itself, this step would be bypassed, and the entire diagnostic process would become automated.
While this does at first glance seem like a bright and shining future for the world of healthcare and medicine, there are absolutely some precautions that need to be taken, and some potential problems that need to be addressed. The first thing I thought of was the potential destruction of an entire job market. A loss of jobs has been one of the predominant arguments against the integration of robotic employees into our country's, and maybe our planet's workforce. This potential has had governments reevaluating the possibility of a standardized income to mitigate the effects of mass unemployment, but that's a whole other argument in itself. The point is, if robots start diagnosing patients as opposed to actual doctors, a massive employment cut in close to the entire medical industry is inevitable. Proponents of the robots' implementation will present the argument that most hospitals are run tight and understaffed, and that replacing the few employees they do have with a multitude of robots would put an end to such an issue. While most would say that solving the issue of understaffing would be a good thing, many doctors in positions that could be potentially replaced obviously think very differently. In addition, regardless of the amount of reassurance and benefits that these robots could possibly bring about, there are certainly still areas where they fall short of regular doctors. Regarding the efficacy of an AI caretaker, I don't think that they will ever replace humans. The relationship between the doctor and the patient is too essential in the healing process to be sacrificed for autonomy. I don't believe that there can be any form of synthetic relationship between a patient and an AI that The diagnostic process, however, is far less personal, and is something that I could see becoming automated. That being said, who is to infringe on what the AI learns to do, and where does the line get drawn? I don't believe that we are doomed for a Terminator style future, but the potential of a network of AI learning from the entire human population's medical records is at the very least unpredictable.
Although I tend to lean towards the side of caution regarding this issue, I can definitely sympathize with those who are overly excited about the future of robotic medicine. And why shouldn't they be? Based on previous research, robotic diagnoses have proven to be more reliable than a human physician in trial after trial. The more research that is put into this premise, the more it seems like an inevitable future. And besides, the systemic fear of becoming subjects of our own creation and placing our lives in a machine's hands has already been addressed; as of now it is no more in danger than being in the hands of a human. Who's to say that putting someone's life in the hands of a team of robot surgeons is any different than placing your faith in a robotic car? While we may not have to answer that question today, the time where we will have to ask ourselves if we are comfortable being treated medically by a machine may be coming sooner than we realize.
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