From Scepticism to Acceptance: An Intriguing Question Raised During My Talk at the World Health Innovation Forum

Dear Friends

I got an opportunity to present “Healing with Intelligence—The AI Doctor Will See You Now: Transforming Medicine Through Technology” at the World Health Innovation Forum happening at AMTZ, Vizag, between December 12, 2024, and December 14, 2024.

My presentation revolved around AI surveillance tools such as:

• COMPOSER (Sepsis Monitoring), deployed at UC San Diego Health.

• Google AI (Verily) for diabetic retinopathy, deployed at Aravind Hospitals in Madurai (Google is not charging for this and is yet to get certification from the Indian government).

I also discussed how, in the future, Doctor = Doctor + AI, supported by analogies. For example:

• How Arvind Sanjeev tweaked an old typewriter by connecting it to ChatGPT using a Raspberry Pi (a mini-computer). Arduino (microcontroller) allowed the typewriter to simulate key presses. Hence you speak to Typewriter. It writes the answer! This is also called a “Ghost writer”.

• Similarly, part of a doctor's knowledge in the future could come from an AI-trained model, making the equation Doctor = Doctor + AI validation.

Additional topics in the presentation included:

• 2024 AI trends setting the path for medical innovations.

• AI performance benchmarks vs. human performance on multiple tasks.

• The AI healthcare market outlook.

• The role of AI in science and medicine.

• AI ethics and controversies.

• A recommended framework for adopting AI in healthcare.

At the end of my presentation, I received an interesting question from a medical practitioner. She asked:

“Why have virtual tutors failed in education settings, even though many experimented with them during COVID-19, and why are people going back to the old-school model? Similarly, why is the remote health model failing, despite the availability of teleconsultation technology?”

It was an intriguing question, but there is no definitive answer at this stage. However, I shared my thoughts:

1. 50 years ago, part of entertainment included street dramas. These dramas were highly emotional and engaging at the time. Today, however, dramas are consumed virtually. As a society, we have come to accept the virtual format for this level of emotion.

2. Education, on the other hand, operates at an Emotion+ (Enhanced Emotion) level. Education is linked to livelihood and has a greater emotional and societal importance. Acceptance of virtual solutions in this domain, therefore, takes more time, and physical intervention is still often necessary.

3. Health operates at an even higher emotional level—Emotion++ (Peak Emotion). It concerns life itself, which is beyond livelihood. Hence, acceptance of virtual or remote health solutions takes much longer.

Eventually, when the performance of virtual AI solutions is on par with or better than human performance, society will likely accept these solutions. However, it will take time—it is a directional shift rather than an immediate one.

AI + Doctor = The Future of Medicine

Ravi Saripalle