Healthcare and medicine are as old as humankind itself, and the common thread that runs from prehistoric times to now is that technological advancements have always come along and helped shape wellness. Technology has always helped shape healthcare and the needs of the medical community have also helped drive technology. It is a symbiotic relationship.
Like the thousands of years that have come before, 2020 is seeing technology shape the way healthcare and medicine work. This technology makes medicine more efficient, more effective, and helps to improve patient outcomes. It also makes the job of healthcare professionals easier and keeps them safer than ever.
Here we will examine how a few of the most cutting-edge modern technologies are changing medicine in this unique and challenging year. The advancement of some of these technologies is directly related to the global pandemic, while others are happening completely outside of that and still others are a mix of both. Now for five ways technology is shaping medicine in 2020.
1. Telehealth
The biggest thing that has shaped the healthcare industry in 2020 is, of course, the global COVID-19 pandemic. Although the virus is tragic and devastating, one thing that the healthcare industry can be proud of is how they, and the technology they use, rose to meet this daunting challenge.
One of the first and most publicized ways that technology helped the healthcare industry deal with COVID-19 was by implementing or increasing the use of telehealth technology. Using cloud-based video conferencing services, healthcare professionals were able to continue to see patients throughout the pandemic. This technology helped keep non-COVID patients away from patients with the virus and helped keep medical professionals safe from possible infection. It also helped flatten the curve, as it eased the physical strain on hospitals.
Telehealth worked so effectively in most cases that it is now a technology that will clearly be used more in the next decade and beyond. Telehealth appointments will continue to diminish the strain on our healthcare systems and keep relatively healthy people away from areas where contagious people are. It will also make the system more efficient for healthcare workers and patients with better triage, quicker diagnosis, shorter appointment times, and more frequent check-ins.
2. Wearable Technology
The growing use of wearable medical technology such as smartwatches has two effects on medicine in 2020. The first is that it connects doctors and patients to give real-time health updates to medical professionals. Previously, checking up on how a patient was doing could only be done at regular intervals during appointments. This led to slower adjustment to treatment. Now, real-time knowledge is available, and fine-tuning can be done much easier.
The other effect wearable tech has on patients is it gives them more ownership over their own healthcare. Instead of relying on medical testing devices at doctor’s offices or hospitals, they now can monitor their own health. This puts more power in patients’ hands and they can more effectively manage and monitor their own health.
3. SaMD
SaMD stands for software as a medical device. This means that the software on its own performs medical functions without needing another medical device to function. This is not to be confused with software in a medical device (SiMD) which is software that helps power or adds functionality to another medical device. Wearable technology (see above) is often driven bySaMD but it is being used on the medical professional side as well.
According to Orthogonal, software use in medicine has experienced a dramatic increase in the last 40 years. It is being used to collect and process the massive amount of data that the medical industry creates as well as to help medical professionals make better, more informed decisions.
SaMD is also helping make medicine more portable and remote. No longer does a doctor or nurse need to go to the medical device to get information; the information can come to them through software installed on a smartphone or tablet. Like telehealth, this is another technology that increases efficiency by requiring less time-consuming in-person interaction.
4. Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are taking the massive amount of data that healthcare creates and processing it to learn more than humans ever could and do so more quickly. When these machines learn, they can better find patterns, abnormalities, or rule out conditions to help with everything from diagnosis to treatment.
Using artificial intelligence to assist doctors in healthcare is a major help. It can cut down on the demands on doctors’ time and help prevent human error. AI can also effectively catch things that the human eye just can’t, which can lead to an earlier diagnosis that is critical in many cases to create a positive outcome.
5. XR
XR is shorthand for the term “extended reality.” This term encompasses both virtual realities (VR) and augmented reality (AR). Both these forms of XR, which are virtual environments and combined real and virtual environments respectively, are helping shape how the medical field operates in 2020.
Virtual reality is providing many benefits in 2020 while being used for many rehabs, therapeutic uses, and advanced education and training purposes. It helps surgeons get better in a simulated environment without having to work on real patients. It is also creating engaging educational programs to walk patients through information about diseases and treatment for issues like cancer, autism, depression, and more.
Augmented reality has more of a hands-on application in the medical field. AR is combining patients’ bodies with virtual overlays to help doctors and patients visualize conditions much more accurately. AR is being used to better help patients describe symptoms, aid nurses in finding veins, and increase accuracy for surgeons, giving them the equivalent of x-ray vision before they make an incision.
Conclusion
These are just a handful of the ways technology is shaping medicine in 2020. There are many more as well, and that number will only continue to grow as the decade goes on. What will be the next tech breakthrough in medicine? It could be related to one of these technologies or something entirely different. The only thing we know for sure is that technology will always help drive medicine forward in ways beneficial to us all.
