Artificial intelligence should influence Medicine greatly. The profession has become far too complicated and is changing far too rapidly for anyone to maintain adequate knowledge. Tradition methods of examination of patients do not differentiate diseases and conditions adequately so differential diagnoses are enormous. No individual can, or should, know all that is needed and remember it all the time.
A quick computer search will now narrow the problems down to manageable sizes and act as an infinite memory.
Doctors will not be replaced by machines, but the education will change and the jobs will change to use computers and the miraculous speed of communication and modern investigations.
When I started to specialise in 1977 I was told to enjoy the job because I would be replaced by a computer within 5 years. This has not yet happened but the machinery and ability to find information about any field has exploded in sophistication and supply. Thanks to Elon Musk every hospital and clinic in the world can have Specialist consultations on demand (except in South Africa where there is no service, thanks to the racist government).
Artificial intelligence should influence Medicine greatly. The profession has become far too complicated and is changing far too rapidly for anyone to maintain adequate knowledge. Tradition methods of examination of patients do not differentiate diseases and conditions adequately so differential diagnoses are enormous. No individual can, or should, know all that is needed and remember it all the time. A quick computer search will now narrow the problems down to manageable sizes and act as an infinite memory.
Doctors will not be replaced by machines, but the education will change and the jobs will change to use computers and the miraculous speed of communication and modern investigations.
When I started to specialise in 1977 I was told to enjoy the job because I would be replaced by a computer within 5 years. This has not yet happened but the machinery and ability to find information about any field has exploded in sophistication and supply. Thanks to Elon Musk every hospital and clinic in the world can have Specialist consultations on demand (except in South Africa where there is no service, thanks to the racist government).