In a recent CBC News story, Dr. Alexander Wong, professor of systems design engineering and Canada Research Chair on artificial intelligence (AI) shared insight on how evolving technology will support health care delivery in rural Canada.
While Wong says the country at large will benefit from AI making health care work more efficient, rural Canadians will see an 'even greater impact' as the science helps doctors, nurses and specialists in regions with fewer staff.
"Resources are even more limited, that's where AI can really come in place," Wong said. "With their expertise having seen this big worldview of thousands, to hundreds of thousands, to millions of different patients, it's able to [take] that knowledge and bring it to rural areas to help improve diagnosis and improve treatment."
Wong said doctors of the near future will use AI as a 'clinical vision support system' that will give staff more insight into illness when they interact with patients.
"When you see a doctor on a computer, they're looking at images, records and data. Now you have this additional AI that provides additional insights and information," added Wong. "Essentially you treat it as a second recommendation."
Some tasks AI may assist health care providers with are:
- Organizing the mountain of paperwork that human staff have to handle currently.
- Taking stress off the system by making patient records and histories much easier to access.
- Assisting with staff scheduling, with a focus on anticipating when shortages will crop up.
- Examining X-rays, MRI scans, CT scans and other digital images that doctors and specialists now study, and providing extremely accurate diagnoses.
The full story is available on CBC News.