Types of Technology
Medical technology has evolved into smaller portable devices, for instance, smartphones, touchscreens, tablets, laptops, digital ink, voice and face recognition and more. With this technology, innovations like electronic health records (EHR), health information exchange (HIE), Nationwide Health Information Network (NwHIN), personal health records (PHRs), patient portals, nanomedicine, genome-based personalized medicine, Geographical Positioning System (GPS), radio frequency identification (RFID), telemedicine, clinical decision support (CDS), mobile home health care and cloud computing came to exist.
Medical imaging and Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) have been long used and proven Medical Technologies for medical research, patient reviewing, and treatment analyzing. With the advancement of imagining technologies, including the use of faster and more data, higher resolution images, and specialist automation software, the capabilities of medical imaging technology are growing and yielding better results. As the imaging hardware and software evolve this means that patients will need to use less contrasting agents, and also spend less time and money.
3D printing is another major development in healthcare. It can be used to produce specialized splints, prostheses, parts for medical devices and inert implants. The end goal of 3D printing is being able to print out customized replaceable body parts. In the following section, it will explain more about 3D printing in healthcare. New types of technologies also include artificial intelligence and robots.
3D printing
3D-printing Sliperiet
3D printing is the use of specialized machines, software programs and materials to automate the process of building certain objects. It is having a rapid growth in the prosthesis, medical implants, novel drug formulations and the bioprinting of human tissues and organs.
Companies such as Surgical Theater, provide new technology that is capable of capturing 3D virtual images of patients’ brains to use as practice for operations. 3D printing allows medical companies to produce prototypes to practice before an operation created with artificial tissue.
3D printing technologies are great for bio-medicine because the materials that are used to make allow the fabrication with control over many design features. 3D printing also has the benefits of affordable customization, more efficient designs, and saving more time. 3D printing is precise to design pills to house several drugs due to different release times. The technology allows the pills to transport to the targeted area and degrade safely in the body. As such, pills can be designed more efficiently and conveniently. In the future, doctors might be giving a digital file of printing instructions instead of a prescription.
Besides, 3D printing will be more useful in medical implants. An example includes a surgical team that has designed a tracheal splint made by 3D printing to improve the respiration of a patient. This example shows the potential of 3D printing, which allows physicians to develop new implant and instrument designs easily.
Overall, in the future of medicine, 3D printing will be crucial as it can be used in surgical planning, artificial and prosthetic devices, drugs, and medical implants.
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a program that enables computers to sense, reason, act and adapt. AI is not new, but it is growing rapidly and tremendously. AI can now deal with large data sets, solve problems, and provide more efficient operation. AI will be more potential in healthcare because it provides easier accessibility of information, improves healthcare, and reduce cost. There are different factors that drive AI in healthcare, but the two most important are economics and the advent of big data analytics. Costs, new payment options, and people’s desire to improve health outcomes are the primary economic drivers of the AI. Based on the reading, AI can save $150 million annually in the US by 2026. Also, AI growth is expected to reach $6.6 million by 2021. Big data analytics is another big driver because we are in the age of big data. The data is extremely helpful to assist the integration of AI in healthcare because it ensures the execution of complex tasks, quality, and efficiency.
Applications of Artificial Intelligence
AI brings many benefits to the healthcare industry. AI helps to detect diseases, administer chronic conditions, deliver health services, and discover the drug. Also, AI has the potential to address important health challenges. In healthcare organizations, AI is able to plan and relocate resources. AI is able to match patients with healthcare providers that meet their needs. AI also helps improve the healthcare experience by using an app to identify patients’ anxieties. In medical research, AI helps to analyze and evaluate the patterns and complex data. For instance, AI is important in drug discovery because it can search relevant studies and analyze different kinds of data. In clinical care, AI helps to detect diseases, analyze clinical data, publications, and guidelines. As such, AI aids to find the best treatments for the patients. Other uses of AI in clinical care include medical imaging, echocardiography, screening, and surgery.
Education
Medical virtual reality provides doctors multiple surgical scenarios that could happen and allows them to practice and prepare themselves for these situations. It also permits medical students a hands-on experience of different procedures without the consequences of making potential mistakes. ORamaVR is one of the leading companies that employ such medical virtual reality technologies to transform medical education (knowledge) and training (skills) to improve patient outcomes, reduce surgical errors and training time and democratize medical education and training.
Robots
Modern robotics have made huge progress and contribution to healthcare. Robots can help doctors to perform a variety of tasks and their adoption in hospitals is increasing tremendously. The following are different ways to improve healthcare by using robots.
Robotic Spinal Surgery
Surgical robots are one of the robotic systems, which allows a surgeon to bend and rotate tissues with more flexibility and efficiency. The system is equipped with a 3D magnification vision system and can translate the hand movements of the surgeon to be precise to perform a surgery with minimal incisions. Other robotics systems include the ability to diagnose and treat cancers. Many scientists have begun working on creating a next-generation robot system to assist the surgeon in performing knee and hip replacement surgeries.
Assistant robots will also be important to help reduce the workload for regular medical staff. They can help nurses with simple and time-consuming tasks like carrying multiple racks of medicines, lab specimen or other sensitive materials.
Shortly, robotic pills are expected to reduce the number of surgeries. They can be moved inside a patient and delivered to the desired area. Plus, they can conduct biopsies, film the area and clear clogged arteries.
Overall, medical robots are extremely useful in assisting physicians; however, it might take time for the providers to be professionally trained to work with medical robots and for the robots to respond to a clinician’s instructions. As such, many researchers and startups were working constantly to provide solutions to these challenges.
Assistive Technologies
Assistive technologies are products designed to provide accessibility to individuals who have physical or cognitive problems or disabilities. They aim to improve the quality of life with assistive technologies. The range of assistive technologies is broad, ranging from low-tech solutions to physical hardware, to technical devices. There are four areas of assistive technologies, which include visual impairment, hearing impairment, physical limitations, cognitive limitations. There are many benefits of assistive technologies. They enable individuals to care for themselves, work, study, access information easily, improve independence and communication, and lastly participate fully in community life.
Tech Geeks 