How Can The Powers Of AI Be Harnessed To Shape The Future Of Healthcare?

Robert Wachter, professor and head of the department of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco is a national leader in the area of patient’s safety in the digital age and is well known for his views on pressing healthcare issues every day. Having authored the book “The Digital Doctor” he takes a deep dive to address the chronicles and challenges of AI in medicine. In his book he takes his readers to examine the highs and lows of technology tools and how he trusts AI to eventually amplify even the human side of empathy and compatibility besides his emphasis on accuracy and patient’s safety.

What is the extended role AI is expected to play in healthcare?

In the evolving world of healthcare, Artificial Intelligence’s transformation on treatment and diagnosis has potentially saved billions of lives through the application of complex algorithms and data points. As Watcher admits that it is far safer with the intervention of super computers than a scenario without them, there is however a lot of scope for improvement. Referring to the incident where a teenager received a huge overdose with antibiotics, such disasters of poorly designed computers could have been avoided in a conventional hospital. This leaves us doubtful, yet hopeful about what Artificial Intelligence can hold in store for us.

Much hope placed with AI to redefine Healthcare

The digital tsunami has taken over the healthcare space with the disruptive innovation of AI. Be it in the fields of diagnosis, treatments or bridging geographical barriers, with cloud-based AI technology, the dependency on small practitioners can be practically nullified. The same goes for decoding X-rays and biopsy’s and the lesser subjectivity to human errors. As Watcher is optimistic that radiology, pathology and dermatology are three main medical fields that will see the strongest wave of digital transformation.

AI stands for Augmented Intelligence

Augmented Intelligence is actually what it is all about. Systems are built by humans and are further elevated to assist and scale human expertise to make well informed decisions. Hence the collaboration between human and computers is very important in shaping successful health systems. Unlike artificial intelligence it is relevant and insightful. So, augmented intelligence is the way forward in the Digital Healthcare world.