I chose to focus on this article in this review because the medical field is often times paving the way as far as integrating innovative and thoughtful designs into their practices. This paper is regarding a Pew Research Study on how Americans feels about AI being involved in the healthcare system, and many are against it. With AI being such a prevalent topic in emerging technology I thought it would be insightful to read these findings to give me basis for how Americans feel about AI being involved in personal and intimate matters.
The survey finds that on a personal level, there’s significant discomfort among Americans with the idea of AI being used in their own health care. Six-in-ten U.S. adults say they would feel uncomfortable if their own health care provider relied on artificial intelligence to do things like diagnose disease and recommend treatments; a significantly smaller share (39%) say they would feel comfortable with this.
One factor in these views: A majority of the public is unconvinced that the use of AI in health and medicine would improve health outcomes. The Pew Research Center survey, conducted Dec. 12-18, 2022, of 11,004 U.S. adults finds only 38% say AI being used to do things like diagnose disease and recommend treatments would lead to better health outcomes for patients generally, while 33% say it would lead to worse outcomes and 27% say it wouldn’t make much difference.
”On the positive side, a larger share of Americans think the use of AI in health and medicine would reduce rather than increase the number of mistakes made by health care providers (40% vs. 27%).
And among the majority of Americans who see a problem with racial and ethnic bias in health care, a much larger share say the problem of bias and unfair treatment would get better (51%) than worse (15%) if AI was used more to do things like diagnose disease and recommend treatments for patients.
But there is wide concern about AI’s potential impact on the personal connection between a patient and health care provider: 57% say the use of artificial intelligence to do things like diagnose disease and recommend treatments would make the patient-provider relationship worse. Only 13% say it would be better (Tyson, 2023).
I find this study to be very interesting in the range of results they received. In topics that don’t concern the ‘human’ element of care such as skin cancer screening “65% of U.S. adults say they would want Al to be used in their own skin cancer screening” (Tyson, 2023). But in most topics concerning a ‘human’ element of care the participants either didn’t believe the AI would help or they don’t want it involved at all. In a place that is so intimate, such as the hospital or doctors Office the ‘human’ care is why you’re there. In the question stated in the last paragraph 57% of participants believes that the patient-provider relationship would get worse if AI was involved in disease diagnosis or treatment plans (Tyson, 2023). This study is a fascinating showing that people care about people, and that even if AI may help in mitigating issues they don’t want it involved in their personal care. Knowing this, how can design use innovation and AI in ways in which it doesn’t become a hinderance to the human interaction that is so necessary in intimate situations?
Source
Tyson, A. (2023, February 22). 60% of Americans would be uncomfortable with provider relying on AI in their own health care. Pew Research Center. https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2023/02/22/60-of-americans-would-be-uncomfortable-with-provider-relying-on-ai-in-their-own-health-care/#:~:text=But%20there%20is%20wide%20concern,say%20it%20would%20be%20better.
