TMRW/TDY
The Future’s Playbook
Read time: 7 minutes
Hey Reader,
If clinician’s struggle to understand and work with administrators, they understand the technologists even less.
But as we described last week – we are in the transition period between the Old Word (Industrial Era) and the New World (Algorithmic Era).
So let’s talk about what this all really means and it’s implications for doctors.
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Economics – Open any college textbook and you’ll know that economics is the study of the allocation of scarce resources. Scarcity is what drives demand which directs society to shift scarce resources to the production of said goods and services.
But…
Technology’s proximate cause is to reduce scarcity by solving problems.
This creates a set up of opposing forces that gives civilization its inherent challenges but also its innovative dynamism.
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The rise of AI means that the greatest source of scarcity in the world – labor – won’t be a factor anymore.
Algorithms and apps can scale with ~ zero marginal costs, which is why they can go viral, and venture capitalists say “software is eating the world.“
Of all the forms of leverage (land, capital, labor, code, media & brand), people are by far the messiest to deal with. Just ask anyone in HR.
So the hope of the Silicon Valley bro’s is to eliminate labor entirely- namely, you and me – and empower software to take over, including healthcare.
Eliminate the role of people – ie their jobs – you eliminate scarcity. That’s the Utopian vision of the new guard .
Love him or hate him, Elon Musk is articulate on this point:
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A world with dramatically less scarcity of goods and services means the traditional understanding of the economy no longer is relevant. A new economic model is needed.
And a new digital currency. Hence, we see the ardent crypto-currency fanatics.
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What does this have to do healthcare?
If there is ever a messy, labor intensive industry that is nothing but about people it is the healthcare industry.
And it is probably the 2nd most hated industry in the country after the airlines.
And like airlines, we all need healthcare.
Hence you see the contempt and desire by tech companies for a slow, tech-phobic, incomplete and frustrating US healthcare system in which they feel doctors are guessing a diagnoses half the time.
For an engineer, this is nails on the chalkboard.
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This attitude powered the now failed Forward clinics. Designed by some ex Google engineers, they sought to create a new tech driven primary care clinic experience and replace doctors as much as possible. They raised a large amount of money but failed spectacularly:
https://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-startup-forward-shutdown-carepod-adrian-aoun-2024-11
You can read my breakdown of their failed business here:
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7264732158215225344/
An AI doc in the box isn’t quite ready for primetime – but it will be.
A universal doctor AI will likely be ready for deployment within 5 to 10 years.
A recent study, while limited, already suggest LLMs like chat gpt could out diagnose physicians (in this case, to diagnose a cholesterol embolism after a vascular procedure).
When doctors no longer have the sole command of medical expertise, then what next?…
Well that’s the question of TMRW…!
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As a last point, what is the most scarce thing in all of the world?
Human lifespan.
It is for this reason that Balaji Srinivasan, Red pill tech investor, argues that the ultimate purpose of technology is human immortality.
In other words, technology and medicine are naturally and increasingly going to converge.
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With this framework, I hope you now have a better understanding of what investments are being made, which companies are starting up and what AI portends for all of us.
As it says in Proverbs “Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding.”
But after understanding comes action. So let’s move to make sure AI – and healthcare – works for all of us.
Forward,
