Robot, MD: Will machines replace doctors?

[MD20]

Healthcare IT NEWS
January 10, 2012 | Mike Miliard, Managing Editor
From the January 2012 </issue/40266> print issue

Are robots poised to join the medical workforce?

Earlier this year a series of articles in Slate by Farhad Manjoo raised some eyebrows – and perhaps quickened some heartbeats. It was titled "Will robots steal your job?" Frighteningly, for some medical professionals the answer was in the affirmative.

We all know how robots are increasingly prevalent in surgical suites, that machines can be better at noticing abnormalities on radiology reports than the human eye and that humanoid robot nurses are already caring for the elderly in Japan – even approximating something of a bedside manner

But the emergence of IBM's uncannily intelligent Watson computer – first his merciless vanquishing of two pitiable human opponents on Jeopardy!, then the news that his natural language processing capabilities and ability to process the equivalent of a million books per second would be put to use in healthcare – seems to have ratcheted things up a bit.

http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/robot-md-will-machines-replace-doctors

[Egalitarian Thug]

1. Without any doubt. It is only a matter of when.

In the civilized world surgical robots are nearly ubiquitous. They do a much better job than humans and there's no worry about putting your life in the hands of a Doctor that graduated at the bottom of his class only by buying the answers for his final and then paying a consulting firm to get him through his boards.

[JDPriestly]

5. I doubt that such a doctor could make it through residency.

I don't think he or she could make it through the practical part of medical school either.

A lot of a doctor's work is with his eyes and ears. I don't see how a robot could process a lot of what doctors process.

[Egalitarian Thug]

9. The robot or the dunce that gets through on money & connections? n/t

[MD20]

6. I think its just around the corner!

I wonder if a diagnosis could be done over some sort of INtranet to include a full physical?
Once such a program got off the ground it could result in considerably lower medical costs.
Even the homeless could line up to run through a "booth," be diagnosed in a few minutes; given a printout of recommendations for treating their ailments and sent off to Cuba for for free treatment and healthcare. I'm serious!

[SomethingFishy]

2. 21b

[dballance]

3. Not Any Time Soon

There is so much a doctor detects by just being with a patient. The patient's demeanor, are they seeing properly out of both eyes. Is their body slumping to one side? What about the color of their face. Are they happy or depressed?

Things it would be hard for a robot to see and process at this time. Especially the happy vs. depressed item.

So I don't have much of a fear for modern medical professionals.

[yortsed snacilbuper]

4. Could you sue a robot,MD: for malpractice,

or are they working for free and don't have a bank account?

[customerserviceguy]

7. Well, you'd never get a robot attorney to do that. n/t

[MD20]

13. Accountability

Accountability is another problem. Who is responsible when something goes wrong? Even with the threat of malpractice hanging over their heads, medical personnel make mistakes that cost 90,000 people a their lives each year in the US alone. I would expect that figure to drop significantly as more well programmed machines are used to relieve the stress under which humans make errors. The robot Md will have an owner; and ,it is the owner who will be liable for anything that goes wrong. Software engineers and programmers might also share culpability... or, the patient might be required to sign a waiver: that would be totally acceptable if the services were very low cost or free!

[Fumesucker]

10. Well, this article is six years old now..

http://www.webmd.com/news/20061109/ask-google-whats-that-disease

<snip>

So Tang and Ng gave Google a chance to solve 26 of the puzzles.

The two doctors selected three to five search terms for each case history. They then typed them into Google and looked over the first five pages of search results for a diagnosis.

Google came up with the correct diagnosis 58% of the time, Tang and Ng report in the current online issue of BMJ, formerly the British Medical Journal.

"Our study suggests that in difficult diagnostic cases, it is often useful to 'google' for a diagnosis," the researchers conclude.

[mick063]

11. They have to.

It is the only way that health care costs can be eventually brought down to affordable levels albeit the initial costs will be prohibitive. Ultimately, costs will eventually go down though.


Insurance is a symptomatic solution. The root cause of the health care problem is what hospitals, clinics, and doctors are charging. This is why the health care debate is totally out of whack.

If you are trying to clean pollution in a river, you start with mitigating the pollution source as opposed to strictly focusing on the never ending task of cleaning it up downstream, with the pollution source unmitigated. Using that analogy, there isn't any adequate means of insuring everyone until the root costs of health care are addressed.

The politics of "Obama-care" are meaningless drivel for both parties. Why are we even talking about insurance to begin with?

Bring on the droids!!!

[MD20]

12. Yeah, bring on the droids soon!

Mick, your take on insurance is interesting. Insurance, though, is one of the factors that drive up the cost of health care. Consider that doctors and hospitals have to carry malpractice insurance too. Mass produced MD robots could relieve the pressure on their flesh and blood counterparts by monitoring,diagnosing and recommending treatments specific to the influx of patients who would otherwise overload the system. Human MDs could still cater to Rich folk, emergency cases and near well to do people in person while the machines handle the masses.

[nanabugg]

14. My question is, will that lower healthcare costs? nt

[MD20]

15. I think it would but there are myriad factors to consider.

If the machines are owned by the people (government) healthcare costs would be negligible. Health Insurance wouldn't be necessary nor would malpractice insurance. See post #12