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People can relax: Robot healthcare is not about to take over, says life sciences tech consultant

April 21, 2017

Posted by: Avadhoot Patil

Roman Chernyshev of DataArt

Rumours of the sudden demise of a raft of jobs in the healthcare sector and other public sector spheres are exaggerated.

This reassurance comes from Roman Chernyshev, senior vice president of Healthcare & Life Sciences at global technology consultancy DataArt.

The idea that doctors and other healthcare professionals could shortly be replaced is simply untrue. The truth is that artificial intelligence (AI) technology for some time has been capable of doing a lot more than simply run trains and pick up calls to general practitioners (GPs) – it is far more sophisticated at the cutting edge of research and development, but not to the standard that is required to actually service people.

The devil is in the detail and this will delay the advent of AI doctors and other healthcare professionals.

Just because robots are intelligent, does not mean that adoption will be quick. There are many hoops to jump through, issues to be resolved, and a huge number of tests and investigations that still need to take place before AI gains sufficient trust in healthcare.

Legal frameworks have to evolve to allow data that is now considered sensitive to flow freely in widely distributed environments. Today’s technology combines services and components that can be anywhere in the world and all of this needs to be made secure, and legally compliant.

But further to this there is a far greater problem. While AI is capable of learning, just like human GPs, AI has to be taught to do its job. There will be different implementations of AI systems trained to do the same stuff that doctors do, but there is no system in sight that can test and confirm the quality of training.

Getting to the point where AI will be deemed as accountable as human doctors today will take years. Adoption of such services will not start with the public sector. The retail and consumer space will pave the way. It will require a long trial period and evolution in a wide range of consumer services before AI makes its way to wide adoption in healthcare.”

The author of this blog is Roman Chernyshev, senior vice president of Healthcare & Life Sciences at global technology consultancy DataArt

About the author:

The author is Roman Chernyshev, senior vice president of Healthcare & Life Sciences at global technology consultancy DataArt. Roman is a regular media commentator on health and life sciences technology and has been quoted in TechWeekEurope, Raconteur, The Times, Internet of Business, IDG Connect, Information Weekand numerous other news outlets. With his team, he works on multiple AI projects across healthcare and life sciences globally.

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