In science fiction automated medical services are common. One example is the autodoc—an autonomous robotic pod that treats the patient within its confines. Medbots, as distinct from the autodoc, are robots that do not enclose the patient, but do their work in a way like a traditional doctor or medic. There are also non-robotic options using remote-controlled machines—this would be an advanced form of telemedicine in which the patient can be treated remotely. Naturally, robots can be built that can be switched from robotic (autonomous) to remote controlled mode. For example, a medbot might gather data about the patient and then a human doctor might take control to diagnose and treat the patient.
One of the main and morally commendable reasons to create medical robots and telemedicine capabilities is to treat people in areas without enough human medical professionals. For example, a medical specialist who lives in New York City could diagnose and treat patients in such desolate areas as New Jersey or Ohio. With such machines, a patient could (in theory) have access to any also radically change health care—after all, a medical robot would never get tired and such robots could, in theory, be sent all over the world, even Florida, to provide medical care. There is, of course, the usual concern about the impact of technology on jobs—if robots can replace medical personnel and increase profits for corporations, that will certainly happen. While robots would excel at programmable surgery and similar tasks, it will probably be some time before robots are advanced enough to replace human medical professionals on a large scale
Another excellent reason to create medical robots and telemedicine capabilities has been made clear by the latest Ebola outbreak: medical personnel are at risk for infection. While protective gear and protocols do exist, the gear is cumbersome, flawed and hot and people often fail to follow protocols. While many people are moral heroes and put themselves at risk to treat the ill and bury the dead, there are no doubt people who are deterred by the very real possibility of a horrible death. Medical robots and telemedicine seem ideal for handling such cases and the more utopian use of robots is to save lives (rather than just take jobs).
First, human diseases cannot infect machines: a robot cannot get Ebola. So, a doctor using telemedicine to treat Ebola patients would be at not risk. This would presumably increase the number of people willing to treat such diseases and lower the impact of such diseases on medical professionals. That is, far fewer would get sick or die trying to treat people.
Second, while a machine can be contaminated, decontaminating a medical robot or telemedicine machine would be easier than disinfecting a human. After all, a sealed machine could be completely hosed down by another machine without concerns about it being poisoned by disinfectants, etc. While patients might be exposed to a contaminated machine, machines do not go home—so a contaminated machine would not spread a disease like an infected or contaminated human would.
Third, medical machines could be sent, even air-dropped, into remote and isolated areas that lack doctors yet are often the starting points of diseases. This would allow a rapid response that would help the people there and help stop a disease before it makes its way into heavily populated areas. While some doctors and medical professionals are willing to be dropped into isolated areas, there are no doubt many more who would be willing to remotely operate a medical machine that has been dropped into a remote area suffering from a deadly disease.
There are, of course, some concerns about the medical machines, be they medbots, autodocs or telemedicine devices.
One is that these medical machines might be so expensive that it would be cost prohibitive to use them in situations in which they would be ideal (namely in isolated or impoverished areas). While politicians and pundits often blather about human life being priceless, actual practice shows they do not act on this. So, the challenge would be to develop medical machines that are effective yet inexpensive enough that they would be deployed where they would be needed.
Another concern is the possibility of a psychological impact on the patient. When patients who have been treated by medical personal in hazard suits speak about their experiences, they often remark on the lack of human contact. If a machine is treating the patient, even one remotely operated by a human, there will be a lack of human contact. But the psychological harm done to the patient would be outweighed by the vastly lowered risk of a disease spreading. Also, machines could be designed to provide more in the way of human interaction—for example, a telemedicine machine could have a screen that allows the patient to see the doctor’s face and talk to her.
A third concern is that such machines could malfunction or be intentionally interfered with. For example, someone might “hack” into a telemedicine device as an act of terrorism. While it might be wondered why someone would do this, it seems to be a general rule that if someone can do something evil, then someone will do something evil. As such, these devices would need to be safeguarded. While no device will be perfect, it would certainly be wise to consider possible problems ahead of time—although the usual process is to have something horrible occur and then fix it. Or at least talk about fixing it.
In sum, the latest Ebola outbreak has (once again) shown the importance of developing effective medical machines that can enable treatment while taking medical and other personnel out of harm’s way.
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