Medical Technology Scenario - Vinod Khoshla

In the future, the majority of physicians’ diagnostic, prescription and monitoring, which over time may approach 80 % of total doctors’/internists’ time spent on medicine, will be replaced by smart hardware, software, and testing.

The first iteration might look like a stage where we see enhancements to traditional medicine with better blood glucose tracking, better software to manage patients, more support tools, for today’s doctor or health professional, better patient compliance tools, better information coordination, etc. Vinod Khosla terms it Vo System. At this level of technology we move away from molecular diagnostics and lab work being collected only in a clinical setting, to testing in kiosks, or mobile care centers and finally at home.

In a V1/V2 or may be V3 system, there will be home testing through finger sticks, exhalation or sampling of other material such as sputum, urine or faces. While V0 systems may be software to help with healthcare workflows, V1 systems will do intelligent routing, alerting users to errors , caution, better treatment etc.

In another 10-15 years we may get assistance from Dr Algorithm, who with press of a button would scan massive historical database, identify thousands of patients with similar symptoms, focus on those who are similar to you, then summarise the diagnosis, treatment and outcomes of those cases.

We will be moving from `practice of medicine' to `science of medicine', data- science- algorithms takes care of diagnosis and robots precision surgery. And doctors would be there to heal and do a better job in that with personalised medical treatment.

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