By Sambidha Gurung '23
Artificial intelligence, commonly called s A.I., are machines that are given the capacity to perform activities that would usually require human intelligence.
A.I. isn’t just limited to futuristic robots, as we humans use it in many aspects of our everyday lives. When we open our phones with face recognition or ask Alexa a question, we are interacting with artificial intelligence. But what does medicine have to do with A.I.? Artificial Intelligence first made its way into medicine during the early 1970s, two decades after its initial development. A.I technology was applied to biomedical issues and soon incorporated into clinical settings in the decades that followed. Now we can find A.I. applications in various aspects of the medical field such as patient diagnosis, remote healthcare, and most notably during the ongoing Covid-19 Pandemic in contact tracing.
Changes in the Health Care System
There are many issues facing the medical community that have the potential to be aided by A.I including misdiagnosis. In 2020, researchers at the John Hopkins University School of Medicine and CRICO Strategies For Patient Care discovered that nearly one in ten patients with significant vascular events, infections, or cancer are misdiagnosed, posessinga serious threat to their well-being. One company called Babylon Health develops technology to combat misdiagnosis to help “patients address symptoms, get faster information about conditions, and proceed to treatment sooner.” The application for emerging A.I. technologies go beyond patient care as developers and researchers look to revolutionize data and medical imaging. According to an article presented by Stanford University, Jeremy Howard, a data scientist and entrepreneur, aims to create an A.I.- powered algorithm that takes quick low resolution scans into high quality scans. With the adoption of this algorithm, physicians can have both high resolution and fast scans at the same time which is currently unattainable. Thus, as A.I is implemented into healthcare it’s less like “The Matrix” and more of a solution to resolving issues that have long hindered health care providers and patients.
The potential of A.I doesn’t mean that there aren’t risks as well. The efficiency that is anticipated with A.I technology could be drawn back by poorly designed systems. Privacy and security also remains a big concern as information collected from patients can be vulnerable to misuse and hacking. Inequities can still be exhibited by A.I systems due to bias data sets that are embedded into algorithms. This can lead to greater bias in the healthcare system against racial communities, LGBTQ+, and other demographics. With this in mind, the ethics of A.I are monitored and there is a big responsibility when using such systems.
As A.I begins to be implemented, it impacts the way we interact with our healthcare system and providers. We might begin to see cuts in medical costs, quicker appointments, and increased efficiency for patients and physicians to connect virtually. A.I should be used as a supplement to existing healthcare systems; one that doesn’t take over the jobs of medical staff, a scenario often reflected in sci fi film and media, but rather uplifts physicians, nurses and patients alike.
References
Basu, K., Sinha, R., Ong, A., & Basu, T. (2020). Artificial Intelligence: How is It Changing Medical Sciences and Its Future?. Indian journal of dermatology, 65(5), 365–370. https://doi.org/10.4103/ijd.IJD_421_20
Powell, A. (2020, November 11). Risks and Benefits of an AI Revolution in Medicine. Harvard Gazette. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2020/11/risks-and-benefits-of-an-ai-revolution-in-medicine/
The Future of Artificial Intelligence in Medicine and Imaging. (n.d.). Stanford HAI. https://hai.stanford.edu/news/future-artificial-intelligence-medicine-and-imaging
Artificial Intelligence in Medical Diagnosis. (n.d.). https://sma.org/ai-in-medical-diagnosis/
Murphy, K., Di Ruggiero, E., Upshur, R. et al. Artificial intelligence for good health: a scoping review of the ethics literature. BMC Med Ethics 22, 14 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12910-021-00577-8
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