I’ve been waiting almost a year to write this blog because I was holding off for a specific event to occur.

                                                                                            Now, it’s happened.  

 

    At the time, there were all kinds of dire predictions about computers taking over sophisticated human functions. I didn’t fret too much about it because there were no real life applications – until now.

    Recently, IBM and Wellpoint, the largest health plan company in the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, announced that the two companies would use Watson’s ability to analyze huge amounts of data to help suggest treatment options and diagnosis to doctors. I’m not concerned that health care professionals will be using computers to help with diagnosis – this has been going on for years - but my concern is that a tool as powerful as Watson may eventually be relied on more and more by health care workers instead of combining their own knowledge with gut instinct, compassion and ethical considerations. This impetus to ‘computer efficiency’ would not necessarily come from doctors but from insurance carriers whose goal it is to lower health care costs sometimes to the detriment of patients’ well being.

    IBM and Wellpoint have made it clear that Watson will not replace doctors and I believe them- for now - but there is no doubt that medical decision making is moving away from doctors and being put in the hands of insurance companies. Doctors rail against this every day. Anyone whose physician has had to fight for reimbursement for what the insurance carrier deemed an unneeded test has experienced this issue. Ditto for drugs that a doctor’s training believes is the right one for particular a patient but whose payment was denied by the insurance carrier.

    Computers cannot learn ethics nor can they apply ethical tenets to patient. No matter how fast and accurate Watson produces a diagnosis decision tree, it lacks the human capacity to be caring and ethical. Certainly, computers can be programmed to obey laws but being ethical requires wisdom, experience and commonsense which computers lack.

    My concern is that if Watson is successful in lowering medical costs, even if it’s done at the expense of patients’ health, it will become part of everyday medicine. From there, it is only a short jump to non-medical companies. What if an internet-based company, with few employees. were to have Watson make its decisions? What happens to their ethical concerns?

    This all seemed far-fetched to me when I watched Watson trounce its human opponents almost a year ago. Now it’s not so futuristic.

The William G. McGowan Charitable Fund provides grants in three program areas including Health care and Medical Research; Education, and Community Programs for Those Most Vulnerable. It gives priority to programs that have demonstrated success, measurable outcomes, have a plan for sustainability, and aim to end cycles of poverty and suffering.