AI, Radiology, and the Future of Work

Artificial intelligence is not a substitute for your radiologist. Indeed, according to this article by The Economist, AI can not make a radiologist redundant, although artificial intelligence and machine learning can analyze large amounts of data almost quickly through algorithms.

However, the rise of artificial intelligence in radiology comes from a variety of cultures, focusing on industrial confusion (reading: destruction) by automation. When visiting the famous Silicon Valley Radiology AI startup in 2016, the attitude of the whole team was focused on "Fracture radiology". They ridiculed the opinion of professional radiologists and appointed radiation oncologists to oversee medical considerations. Geoff Hinton's comment from the Machine Learning Conference in 2016 in Toronto represents a strong confidence in the field of machine learning - "If you are a radiologist, you are like a coyote at the edge of the cliff I think it is ... within 5 years, deep learning is better than radiologists ... it may take up to 10 years. "

If there is one thing I want to cry for a person who says that AI will replace a radiologist, that is it - radiologists are not just to look at pictures! All media promotion on artificial intelligence in radiation medicine involves only image perception, and as shown in the following figure, image perception is not done by human radiologists in their daily work. In addition, the figure above shows only the diagnostic workflow, which shows the work for patients (ultrasonic examination, fluoroscopy, biopsy, drainage etc.), interdisciplinary work such as oncology committee, Training and differential examination are completely omitted. Diagnosis Radiologist will also do it periodically. I know that radiologists are only working on diagnostic reports as full-time jobs. There is even another interventional radiology program closer to surgery than image recognition, which is also a profession that is suffering from the labor crisis and has little to benefit from the AI ​​system.