I was all set to do my AI-assisted post on the importance of branding this week when I saw the article that Dr. Kelsey posted, "Corti, an AI 'co-pilot' for healthcare clinicians, raises $60M" and it stopped me in my tracks. As a former healthcare clinician and someone who spent a lot of time trying to make oncology clinics more efficient, I had to take a minute to blog about my thoughts. To be honest, I don't know exactly where I land on the topic, but I want to spend some time thinking through the pros and cons.
Pros: Let's start by thinking through the obvious. Healthcare workers are burned out. I was burned out before the pandemic. Post-pandemic, patients are sicker and meaner, and there are fewer experienced clinicians in the field (yes, I acknowledge that I am one who bailed). Specialties like oncology, emergency medicine, and intensive care are hit particularly hard. Patient-facing physicians are in a grind. See more patients in less time, and oh, by the way, a lot more of them are a hot mess. Introducing technology that allows a clinician to work smarter and not harder may alleviate some of this burden and potentially improve patient outcomes.
Cons: I could start this paragraph the same way I started the last. Several big red flags can't be ignored. Job stability is one concern that very few industries are fully immune to. For me, the concern with this is much bigger. While this AI can be a massive time saver, what if it becomes a crutch? If history repeats itself, we can assume that the increased efficiency will also equal increased workload. If it goes so far that the clinician is overdependent on the machine that they stop checking for accuracy, where are we? I don't believe that AI can ever replace intuition and experience - so what happens when we don't pay enough attention? I also think about the patient perspective. Do I want a machine making my medical recommendation?
At the end of the day, I remain conflicted. I think there is significant potential for appropriately and carefully implementing AI in healthcare. As humans and clinicians, we are charged to use this potential thoughtfully and with a great deal of oversight. It seems like a slippery slope, with the potential to be both amazing and enable greater advances while somehow setting us back.
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