It’s time to leave Medicine
Category: It’s Time To Leave Medicine
How Theresa May’s No-deal Brexit Will Affect Your Facebook Access (And Why That Matters)
Next month, Brexit will officially be in force.
And when that happens, many of the doom-and-gloom projections will suddenly become a present reality.
Border access. The 236 daily truckloads of fruit and veg to the UK. Access to Interpol. The NHS supply chain of vital medicines.
But there’s at least one thing you don’t need to be worried about.
Accessing your Facebook account.
Barring a glitch at Facebook HQ, chances are excellent that you will still be able to check your newsfeed, post a story to your sister in Munich, tune into a Facebook Live broadcast by an author from Brussels and argue on Facebook Messenger with fellow GoT fanatics.
None of that will change at all…and that’s hugely important.
Because if we can count on being able to access Facebook, then is it possible that we can use this constant as a tool for stabilising other areas of lives post-Brexit?
I think so.
You see, Facebook is simply an example of a private, non-government dependent online platform that connects people from around the world.
What if communities around the UK decided to network with each other to create their own supply chains for whatever they need?
What if Doctors throughout Great Britain and Europe decided to network across traditional lines to create their own supply chain…and then invited patients to connect with it?
“How can we turn this into a Facebook?” might be a useful question to ask about every area that seems uncertain.
Invasion of the Pillow robots
Image: Forbes.com
Don’t be fooled by the little old lady and the innocent robot that’s keeping her company and helping Grandma remember her medication.
That’s the hook of this story by Jennifer Hicks about Pillo health and Orbita’s healthcare companion robots:
Because the next stage, once Pillo health and Orbita achieve threshold market penetration& are acquired by Amazon/Google/Facebook et al will be:
This Healthcare companion robot that helps you remember your medication will then be the Healthcare companion robot that PRESCRIBES your medication.
And when there is a direct connection between patients and technology that is able to administer realtime 24/7 healthcare monitoring and provide relevant treatment from its associated global supply chain…how exactly are you as a Doctor still relevant in that scenario?
Seriously, how? A serious question worth taking a minute to answer right now.
In fact, it’s one that Doctors are answering in this survey that closes within the next 2 days. (Thursday 31st January 2019, 11.45p.m UTC-11)
Tech that’s comes through the backdoor of convenience ends up kicking the complacent out through the front door of progress.
Don’t be complacent!
Thoughts? 🙂
Why do we still need human Doctors when we’ve got AI and robots?
That’s the question I’ve been exploring in an anonymous survey of Doctors that I’ve been carrying out…and the responses so far have been fascinating.
I’m sharing the results first with everyone who takes part once I’ve compiled them. So if you’d like to play along, then click the link below before this Thursday 31st January 2019 (Deadline is 11.45pm, UTC-11) :
Doctor dies after working 18 hours
In response to this story about the late Dr Zhao Bianxiang:
Maintaining systems where the well-being of the many is built off the exploitation of the few is not new.
Maintaining systems where the well-being of the many is built off the exploitation of the few is not new.
We’ve been doing this throughout history in every culture around the world…just as we are still doing in the NHS. The question is: what are we going to do about this?
Two options.
Door #1: Do nothing. Whinge about it every now and again, express outrage at the deaths and suicides of the Medics who are crushed by the system, but ultimately carry on with the status quo.
Door #2: Dare to take simple actions that actually change the status quo. Things like: refusing to prescribe less sleep for yourself than you do for your patients…creating enough financial leverage to allow you to say “No” to stupid requests that damage your spiritual, mental and emotional well-being…making time to explore alternative career paths before you’re forced to by changes in medical technology…taking 30 minutes this weekend to setup an automated savings account using an app like Plum…
Simple steps that are far less emotionally demanding than putting up with the endless nonsense of the current healthcare system setups.
Because when Medics start to prioritise their own health – putting on their own oxygen masks first – and put themselves in a position where they do not need the NHS to survive…that’s when the healthcare system will change.
Thoughts?
Medics being shot in Sudan
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men should do nothing.” – Edmund Burke
Medics in Sudan are being shot, simply for being Medics.
Simply because they possess the potential to take a stand against oppressive leadership and speak out against unjust legislation.
Simply because they are willing and able to objectively diagnose a situation and prescribe the correct course of action that they’re willing to follow through on.
We’re not being shot in the UK and many other parts of the world.
Instead, we’re being sleep-deprived, overworked and stripped of our humanity such that we can be eventually be replaced by next-generation robotic empaths.
And whilst we can feebly protest, whinge and whine on social media or just wait for somebody else to do something about it…we can do much more than that.
You can do much more than that.
You are one of the most intelligent and respected human beings on the planet.
You have ideas, creativity and leadership skills that you’ve not even begun to tap into.
And you have the power to make things better in your own life, such that you have the freedom to have an impact in the lives of others.
Start with you. Free yourself. And then use that freedom to help those around you.
But whatever you do, remember:
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men should do nothing.” – Edmund Burke
Human empathy and sex robots
Part of a debate happening in the Junior Doctor’s Contract group about human empathy and AI. Here’s something I shared that I hope will be of value (particularly the last 3 paragraphs)
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Doctor’s comment: there will be a place for AI but it will never fully make human drs redundant. Ultimately decisions regarding best interests will need to be made and just because something has been found doesn’t mean anything needs doing about it etc. A large part of medicine is about human empathy, difficult to artificially create that.
My response:
Thanks for pointing this out Jamie, as it further underscores the dangers that unprepared Doctors are facing. I agree with you that human empathy is at the heart of medicine. But I disagree that empathy is difficult to artificially create, given that stressed, overworked, sleep deprived Medics have to artificially create empathy all the time. We don’t feel like being empathetic all the time. And in those moments, the techniques we use to create an empathetic connection with a patient are easily replicated by the current state of AI-powered robot doctors…robot doctors that don’t get tired or stressed.
And when you consider an entire generation of patients being trained to emotionally engage with search engines, Alexa, Siri and even AI-powered sex robots (https://www.forbes.com/sites/andreamorris/2018/09/25/prediction-sex-robots-are-the-most-disruptive-technology-we-didnt-see-coming/#61437b3b6a56)…interacting with an attentive, caring robot unit when you’re unwell isn’t hard to imagine.
Even with this reality upon us, your point about human empathy is vital. Human empathy is the only real value proposition that Medics have to offer…and they’re competing with AI-robots in delivering it.
But when you consider how the current healthcare system is systematically stripping Medics of their empathy for their patients, Doctors need to make radical changes to guard their ability to empathise with other human beings at all costs…to avoid becoming collateral damage of progress.
I think one way of doing this is for Medics to reinvent themselves and find ways to express their full range of talents, whether or not they can figure out a way to integrate them into the current healthcare system.
Writers, musicians, dancers, painters, coders, YouTubers, video gamers…Medics should explore ways to work in these areas, and even get paid for doing the other things that they love.
Once Medics are financially and emotionally independent of the healthcare system, they’re then free to engage with it from a position of generosity, empathy and inventiveness that will complement and direct the progress of AI technology in medicine.
Thoughts? 🙂