MEDITECH Blog

How clinicians can use AI to improve patient care [Podcast]

AI can suggest the newest movies for you to watch or navigate you to your destination with a single click — if AI helps people in their everyday lives, why shouldn’t healthcare utilize this technology too? 

On the latest MEDITECH Podcast, I had the pleasure of speaking with Jayson Marwaha, MD, MSc, a general surgery resident and postdoctoral fellow in surgical AI at Harvard Medical School, to learn more about how AI is helping shape the future of healthcare.

Jayson believes that introducing AI to healthcare is the best way to enhance patient care. Together we discussed his work at Harvard Medical School, which focuses on building, validating, and deploying AI that helps physicians make better decisions and improves patient care. 

Referencing how AI is used in daily life, Jayson argued that technology should be employed in the same capacity by healthcare professionals, saying, “It’s time for healthcare to catch up.”

Understandably, healthcare is slow to embrace AI in an industry where human lives are involved, but Jayson addressed the hesitation many feel by making a necessary distinction.

“AI is not meant to replace surgeons or replace any provider”, he explained. “Really it’s meant to augment their decision making.” 

The complementary work done by physicians and technology can prove to be the best way to ensure the highest quality of patient care.   

“The amount of data we are confronted with far outpaces our human ability to process it all objectively,” he said. Jayson clarified that the more data known about the patient, the better equipped doctors are to provide care. But, humans can only remember so much. AI is here to bridge the gap.

Tune into the MEDITECH Podcast to listen to my full interview with Jayson, and make sure to subscribe today to learn more about technology that is changing the future of medicine.