Artificial intelligence and machine learning create new healthcare markets and promise to fight most of known health issues. Experts in the field of medicine and pharmaceutics support this statement and say that advanced technologies will significantly improve well-being of the global population in the next 20 years.
Current projects and scientific researches demonstrate the impressive results, so there is a high probability that that healthcare will undergo revolutionary changes. So, let’s check the most promising niches of AI investment and development.
Medical Records Digitization
The natural-language processing is one of the basic AI approaches, which is applicable not only to the medicine. It deals with a simple, yet very important task – an interpretation of the humans’ speech and writing.
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It helps to enhance creation of the electronic medical records: doctors and nurses can dictate notes instead of typing them on the tablets. It saves a lot of time and drives the work productivity.
Also it helps to recognize text of the old paper records and add them to the global database, which will be used for further healthcare studies. The more data are collected the more accurate results will be obtained.
The point is that not every country in the world has already implemented the electronic medical records. For this reason, most of machine learning algorithms in the healthcare industry are based on information provided by the U.S. and West European medical institutions. However, for deeper understanding of the medical issues, it’s important to study data gathered from all over the world.
It means that AI developers should digitize medical records from all countries, including those one, which significantly lag behind the technological progress. With the help of the top translation companies it’s possible to develop an algorithm, which will interpret even rarely used languages. So, AI experts will be able to collect medical records from all continents.
Command Centers Automation
AI can improve the overall hospital efficiency and reduce the excessive costs. Creating AI command center, medical institutions can improve the patients’ arrival process, facilitate the beds and operating rooms assigning and optimize the working schedules for physicians and nurses. When all administrative processes are centralized, hospital works like a clock.
AI analyzes the previously collected data and estimate how long every diagnostic procedure and surgery will take. It helps to optimize the schedule of the rooms’ and labs usage and, consequently, serve the maximum number of ill people.
Revenue of the hospitals heavily relies on the quantity of the patients treated, so this little improvement will have a huge positive impact. In this way, medical centers can get extra profit and spend it on the advanced equipment or any other needs.
Visual Diagnostic
AI helps to analyze the visual patterns more precisely than a human eye. Specifically designed software can store and compare thousands of X-ray images, results of tomography and ultrasonography. AI can detect the smallest abnormalities and define the first signs of the dangerous diseases.
An average physician carries out a visual diagnostics on the basis of his personal knowledge and experience, while AI works with a database, which is in thousands times bigger. Software completes this task more accurate by 5-10%, which are crucial for seriously ill patients. Establishing the precise diagnosis of cancer, Alzheimer and Parkinson diseases is the first step to the proper treatment.
Obviously, a doctor is still responsible for a final decision made. The mission of AI software is to flag any anomalies and measure their sizes: for example, find a tiny tumor and accurately evaluate its parameters. In few years, advanced software will be able to describe the nature of the modified cells and help to discover cancer on the initial stage.
Medical Chatbots
Chatbot usage in the healthcare industry is growing year by year. Today, one small app in ordinary smartphone can help to analyze the basic symptoms, verify insurance and book a medical appointment. In the next few years, AI-powered chatbots will be able to partly substitute the administrative workers and cut the hospitals’ cost.
Some of the medical chatbots can remind patients to take a pill on time or inform a nurse about the changes of the patient’s blood pressure. But the latest AI technologies help to solve even more important problems.
For example, developers design the virtual companions for senior people and patients with Alzheimer’s disease. App helps these people to practice their communication skills: discuss various topics, share memories, give advices, etc. This solution is beneficial for patients, who try to figh such symptoms as confusion, delusions or amnesia; AI can significantly improve the quality of their lives.
Surgical Robotics
Surgical robotics helps surgeons to perform minimally invasive surgeries, which reduce the risks of infection and complications. Also it boosts the recovery, so patients can get back to the normal life sooner.
Today, modern technologies offer an outstanding vision system that allows doctors to see a clear 3D picture inside the human’s body. Consequently, surgeon can make every move of scalpel as precise as possible. And this is the biggest difference between the humans and robots.
While surgeons need time to think and analyze the situation, robot works fast and effectively. When surgery is programmed by a computer, then every cut is accurate, so healthy tissue remains undamaged. It’s extremely important in a neurosurgery, where one unnecessary movement can lead to the full or partial paralysis of the body or memory loss.
In other words, usage of the surgical robotics allows not only control every microscopic cut, but also eliminates a human error. Today, scientists are designing robots, which will be able to define and destroy cancer cells and even set bones.
Final Thoughts
Healthcare sector is huge and it’s developing decade by decade. Artificial Intelligence is a new driving force, which pushes the borders of medicine forward and creates new markets.
In the next 50 years or less, AI can totally transform the healthcare system and make it free from human error. Experts from all over the world believe that medical industry will benefit the most from an investment in AI development.