Why you’re more likely to see a physician assistant than a doctor

Dr. Aziz Nazha, the oncologist in charge of the Cleveland Clinic’s Center for Clinical Artificial Intelligence, has a controversial opinion about what kind of training the next generation of doctors should undergo. “Physicians of the future should know how to program,” he said, “but I know I won’t win that battle.”

The fact that there are even discussions about whether coding should be a requirement of medical school is just one of the many changes at hand for the millions of clinicians who make up the U.S. health care workforce.

Not only are there predicted shortages of nurses and physicians that are expected to worsen over the next decade, industry attempts to shift from a fee-for-service reimbursement model to a value-based system have called for more efficient clinicians and better care for patients.

At the same time, hospitals are increasingly turning to artificial intelligence tools like chatbots and digital scribes and machine-learning models that aim to predict readmission rates and examine mammograms for breast cancer. (Even the tech giants are starting to dabble in health care. Apple Inc. is trying to improve nursing workflow, while Alphabet Inc.’s Google is testing whether digital voice assistants can reduce the amount of time doctors spend entering patient information into the electronic health record.)

All of these trends are influencing how care is delivered and by what kind of clinician. In the exam room of the future — which may be your living room — the doctor may ask about your feelings or know how to code, a physician assistant may be virtual or human, and a nurse may be assisted by a robot.

The full MarketWatch article can be viewed at this link.