How A Unifying ‘Language Of Medicine’ Has The Potential To Make (And Break) Healthcare.

Consider a world in which we all understand one another; a world in which we not only speak the same language but also have the vocabulary to comprehend those whose working lives are profoundly different to our own. In such a world, economists could communicate with politicians; politicians could communicate with voters; voters could even discuss Minecraft with their children. Whether or not you consider this prospect attractive, it’s not a scenario that seems likely to come about any time soon. The world is now too complex, and our lives too short, for any one individual to master it all. Even Einstein, despite his extraordinary grasp of physics, still needed help with his maths. In fact, ‘too much knowledge’ can be problematic even within a single field, including medicine. In the19th century, medical understanding was sufficiently slender that a single physician could command it all; yet managing a serious condition today can require specialist doctors, specialist nurses and even specialist operators of medical machinery. Often, it’s not only a question of visiting different departments within the same institution but different institutions or even different countries. Hardly surprising then that regulatory authorities charged with licensing medicines, and the national health authorities responsible for coordinating patient care, have sought to digitize their worlds. Here, ‘Digitize’ can mean the creation of unstructured, electronic text (an email or PDF, for...
Source: EyeForPharma - Category: Pharmaceuticals Authors: Source Type: news