A great deal has been written about the impact that technology will have on society in the decades ahead. Road safety experts believe that autonomous vehicles could all but eliminate traffic accidents in the not too distant future, and some leaders in the technology sector think that medical algorithms will soon be making diagnoses of patients in Oklahoma and around the country instead of general practitioners and specialists.
Robots are already being used to perform many common forms of surgery, and some industry experts feel that this is only the beginning. They say that medical research being conducted around the globe is generating a mountain of data that only advanced algorithms can process and apply appropriately, and they point out that human error claims far more lives in U.S. hospitals and clinics than it does on the nation’s roads.
For most of human history, doctors struggled to help their patients even though they knew little about the illnesses that ailed them, but physicians now have too much information at their disposal according to some industry analysts. While doctors have their experience and colleagues to call upon, algorithms can study hundreds of biomarkers simultaneously and compare their observations with databases of information culled from tens of millions of patients. These programs can also be written to interact with other algorithms and share information on a global scale with incredible speed.
Any technological advance that has the potential to reduce or eliminate doctor errors will be welcomed. Patients can be robbed of years of healthy life when a serious medical condition goes undiagnosed, and even minor errors can fuel anxiety, fear and despair. Medical malpractice litigation can be ruinously expensive for insurance companies and medical professionals, and attorneys with experience in this area may urge the defendants in these cases to not risk their reputations and settle quickly.