Artificial Intelligence in today’s world is developing rapidly. It is expected that by 2025 AI systems market will reach 791.5 billion dollars in revenue. In my article I want to focus on how AI is affecting the world’s health care. And I’m not going to show you a super fancy robot that will replace every doctor and even perform surgeries, but something that is way more accessible to people around the globe.
Ada Health is a free medical, symptom-checking app. It helps you check your symptoms and discover what might be causing them. With the help of Artificial Intelligence, Ada compares your case with thousands of medical documents and conditions to give you the most possible causes. The app is available in seven different languages: English, German, Portuguese, Spanish, French, Swahili, and Romanian. Swahili and Romanian were added thanks to funding from Fondation Botnar. It gives 119 million people more access to medical guidance. Ada has now over 12 million users and completed 28 million symptom checks.
How does a symptom check work?
The app is designed like a chatbot. First you have to start symptom assessment. The AI gets smarter the more you tell so you are asked a few simple questions (name, gender, date of birth and some personal questions about your health state). Then you can choose whether this assessment is for yourself or someone else. From there you are searching for your symptoms and briefly describe it. If you don’t know any of the medical terms you have the ability to check it within the app (short explanation with a picture). When all the questions are finished Ada’s AI processes your answers and you get your report. Note that this is not a medical diagnosis, but only a suggestion what might be the cause and suggests what you could do.
Ada is providing people with more information about their current state and suggest taking better health related actions. With the use of Swahili, it will be a game changer in developing countries of Africa, where people don’t have access to proper healthcare, or it is too expensive for them. The app will make them aware of their own health.
Ada is doing a great job at what it is supposed to do, but there is still a problem with accessibility of healthcare. Governments in developing countries should work with initiatives like this one and develop a new healthcare system. In my opinion apps like Ada should be used to interview and diagnose. Then a person would only go for a quick examination and receive medical advice from a doctor. It could make the poor systems more efficient, and one doctor would serve more people at the time.
In the future the app should be developed to gain and use even more personal information about one’s health. It could involve congenital diseases, allergies, eating habits, sports activity, but also information gathered everyday thru your smart devices. It could be integrated into your personal medical system that guides you with every aspect of your health.
Thank you for your time. Let me know what you think about this project and could it actually improve healthcare?
Sources:
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/27/samsung-and-bayer-invest-in-ai-doctor-app-ada-health.html
Very interesting idea, I see the potential for one of the most innovative apps. I didn’t read it in the article, but it would be useful to have a system of accounts that would remember our previous illnesses and take them into account during diagnosis. It will also be necessary to pay attention to security, because the data that this application collects is potentially very vulnerable to theft by cyber criminals.
Interesting App to say the least. The chatbot implementation seems good because it will be easily accessible by everyone at any moment in time. Perhaps the App could give more specific advice for more specific cases so that visiting the doctor is limited which would be very useful especially in the time of another pandemic. But overall a good idea with a big potential.
I find it shocking that we aren’t told more about it. It could be a game changer in the worldwide healthcare system. Most importantly, such an invention could be implemented in regions with difficult healthcare access or a shortage of doctors. Of course, it won’t replace a trained medical professional. Still, it will encourage people to seek medical attention when they think it to be something minor and not worth the hassle of booking an appointment at a hospital.