Week 4 I Medicine, Technology, and Art

One of the facts that interested me the most in this week’s unit of technology, medicine, and art came during part two of Dr. Vesna’s lectures.  As an aspiring physician, I thought that science, technology, and medicine had been intertwined for a long time so you can imagine my surprise when she mentioned that the close intermingling of these disciplines began relatively recently in the 20^th century (Vesna).  My belief actually stems from the debate raging today that say today’s doctors are too dependent on technology and that it is leading to several adverse effects on medicine.

An overlay of some of the images that can be provided with today's medical technology

This week I decided to look into this debate over the role of technology in the medical field.  One article in the BMJ discusses the growing cost of receiving health care and attributes it to the availability of advanced but expensive medical technology that health care providers are relying on too heavily (Hoffman 1).  Additionally, other opponents state that this heavy reliance on technology is causing doctors to lose diagnosis skills as they depend on machines to be their crutch (Aw).

An example of an application that makes diagnoses for the doctor

Despite these criticisms of technology in medicine, we cannot ignore the fact that technological advancement is revolutionizing health care.  For example, we are beginning to look into the development of personalized medicine which looks at a patient’s genetics and biomarkers in order to determine what treatment would work best for them as an individual (Personalized Medicine).  If we were to cut back on technological advancement in medicine, we could be losing out on important developments such as this one.  Perhaps a better answer is to reevaluate when the technologies we have available are necessary, both as patients who tend to demand the most advance treatment available and as physicians (Hobson).

Personalized medicine will allow for better pre-screening and pre-categorization of patients

Works Cited

Aw James. "Digitally Numb: Doctors Are Losing Hands-on Diagnosis Skills by Relying Too Much on Technology." National Post. National Post, 10 June 2014. Web. 25 Apr. 2015.

Hobson, Katherine. "Cost of Medicine: Are High-Tech Medical Devices and Treatments Always Worth It?" US News. U.S.News & World Report, 10 July 2009. Web. 26 Apr. 2015. Hofman, Bjorn M. "Too Much Technology." The British Medical Journal 350 (2015): n. pag. Web. 26 Apr. 2015. <http://www.bmj.com/content/350/bmj.h705>. "Personalized Medicine." U.S. Food and Drug Administration. US FDA, 30 Jan. 2015. Web. 26 Apr. 2015. Vesna, Victoria. "Medicine Pt2." YouTube. YouTube, n.d. Web. 26 Apr. 2015. <https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=59&v=psjnQarHOqQ>.