The real disruption is in giving power to the patient not the doctor. I want that power. I check online resources all the time about every sign and symptom I get, about every drug and medicine and about all procedures in order to avoid visits at all cost, only for surgery, only as last resource.
Yes, self-medication is wrong, right now is wrong, and there exactly is the disruption. Give information to the patients as a first line of defense, then let doctors handle the special cases.
This is a hard one.. you want a cautious doctor but at the same time you need someone who will order the test when necessary and is not overworked. The balance is in self advocating and not crying wolf. That is the problem AI needs to solve.
An idea for mixing AI with healthcare, using Tensor Flow with a huge image database of skin conditions so the user takes a pic on a phone and it determines the illness and the cure.
The societal challenges will be a devil to defeat. FYI I actually quit my Wall St job several years ago, did something similar with diagnostic imaging, built a working classifier that is doctor-level sensitive (low false negative especially). For us it was near impossible to succeed in the US because the US healthcare system is designed from all directions to be inefficient.
Our tepid success came from moving overseas temporarily and proving out the system in a smaller country with a forward-looking healthcare system with less conflicts of interest. We focused on a local problem (Tuberculosis.) Even then, I'm almost two years in and ended up acquiescing to a premature acquisition because the healthcare system is so difficult to navigate. My lockup is almost complete, the next startup, I'm going to focus on something easier like world peace.
I don't mean to discourage you, but you would likely be a lot more successful if you have some "in" with a hospital system willing to work with you. IMHO, in healthcare, the technology is the easiest part.
Incidentally...yes...we've built it on TensorFlow! And if you do wish to talk tech about this idea, feel free to reach out to me.
I'm doing this right now actually. The risk with using ML - in particular NN methods, in health care is that you have to be able to explain and support your conclusions.
Also depending on the training set used you can get some VERY bad results.
I've looked into this. There are actually a couple of attempts that use basic heuristics for detecting melanoma such as color, symmetry, and size. However, it's harder here in the US since you have to get approved by the FDA in order to make a "diagnosis".
> This population has to navigate a world with substandard services, low quality housing, overcrowded schools, and crime in their neighborhoods. They are often unbanked and living paycheck to paycheck.
Tiny houses, tiny schools, tiny cops and tiny banks can solve their problems, but there are legal hurdles.
Yes, self-medication is wrong, right now is wrong, and there exactly is the disruption. Give information to the patients as a first line of defense, then let doctors handle the special cases.