The peaceful co-existence of man with machine has long been celebrated until, that is, it seemed like machine/technology would replace man. This is not an uncommon concern as well in the healthcare sector. However, experts are emphatic that digitalization of healthcare is not making doctors redundant. Rather, they claim that digitalization has all the more humanized the patient-doctor encounter.
Whereas once doctors had to collect valuable information from patients at the first encounter, the digitalization of healthcare has enabled patients to collect their own health data through various medical devices and gadgets. Equipped with their personal health data, doctors are encountering a different sort of patient in their offices.
As long as the data is reliable, and there’s ample evidence that it is, rather than history taking, doctors have been freed up to engage in history checking. This has made patients rather than the procedures and processes, the focus of the encounter, and has thus re-humanized the patient-doctor meeting. This is a notable development.
Through digitalization, the return to the centrality of the patient in healthcare has made the field of medicine more human again, say experts. This development augurs well for the future of doctors, patients, and healthcare in general. We might say that AI and technological advances have resulted in a fait accompli as health data collection by patients as a practice, is here to stay.
According to Dr. Jens Hartel, Managing Director of the Healthcare Company Vilua of Arvato CRM Solutions cited in a Majorel.com article not long ago, “The interaction between human beings, or the human ability to empathize, isn’t something that can be replaced by machines any time in the foreseeable future, and more and more attention will be paid to these aspects once again [because of the digitalization of healthcare]”.
In addition, the new pool of data available to doctors is increasingly turning healthcare from treatment-based to preventive wellness oriented. In no way is it asserted here that the processes and procedures at hospitals are irrelevant or in some way redundant or that patients have been unduly neglected but this article speaks to a reframing of the doctor-patient encounter. In terms of health data collection, workflow and time saved, the informed and equipped patient is certainly a welcomed encounter for a doctor.
