60% of Americans Would Be Uncomfortable With Doctor Relying on AI

Calendar March 2, 2023 | Posted by admin

A new Pew Research Center survey explores public views on artificial intelligence (AI) in health and medicine – an area where Americans may increasingly encounter technologies that do things like screen for skin cancer and even monitor a patient’s vital signs. The figures demonstrate that on a personal level, there’s significant discomfort among Americans with the idea of AI being used in their own health care. Six-in-ten U.S. adults say they would feel uncomfortable if their own health care provider relied on artificial intelligence to do things like diagnose disease and recommend treatments; a significantly smaller share (39%) say they would feel comfortable with this.

One factor in these views: A majority of the public is unconvinced that the use of AI in health and medicine would improve health outcomes. The Pew Research Center work, conducted Dec. 12-18, 2022, of 11,004 U.S. adults finds only 38% say AI being used to do things like diagnose disease and recommend treatments would lead to better health outcomes for patients generally, while 33% say it would lead to worse outcomes and 27% say it wouldn’t make much difference.

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3D Printing Pills In 7 Seconds

Calendar April 1, 2022 | Posted by admin

Long lines at the pharmacy may soon be a thing of the past! Getting your hands on needed medication can be a lengthy process with multiple steps involving doctor’s visits, referrals, prescriptions, and trips to the pharmacy. Moreover, mass-manufactured medicines may treat only some of your symptoms, relying on a one size fits most approach.

A new method for manufacturing medicines could solve some of these problems in the future. Alvaro Goyanes from the Department of Pharmacology at the University of Santiago de Compostela, and colleagues, have used innovations in 3D printing to produce customized pharmaceuticals in seconds. Their findings have been published in the journal Additive Manufacturing.

There are multiple 3D printing technologies, each of which utilize a different method for turning raw materials into printed objects. Some start as a powder or filament which is manipulated into a finished product, while others use a container filled with printable liquid. This method is known as vat polymerization and typically involves interactions with light which transform liquid monomers into solid polymers. In nearly every instance, the printing happens one layer at a time, which can mean that printing even small objects requires a considerable investment of time. Scientists used a modified version of vat polymerization to drastically reduce the amount of time needed to print medications.

“Normally, in 3D printing, what you’re doing is called additive manufacturing. Every time you create a layer it takes time because the printer moves, or something changes. We created a mirrored system with light coming from three directions. There are no layers, the reaction takes place all at the same time,” explained Goyanes.

Typically, vat polymerization printers have only one source of light at the bottom, and layers are created one at a time, but this new system creates the entire object all at once, at the point where the three light sources come together. The entire printing process takes as little as seven seconds.

To create pharmaceuticals, researchers mixed active drug compounds into the monomers while they are in their liquid state. Once the printing is complete, those compounds are trapped within the polymers. Importantly, multiple tablets can be printed at one time, reducing the print time per tablet.

“Right now, we are printing three tablets at a time, but it’s possible to print more than that at the same time. The fastest we managed to print was seven seconds, so the time per tablet is only a couple of seconds,” Goyanes said.

It’s worth noting that the monomers they’re using to print their medicine tablets are not currently approved for pharmaceutical use and further research is needed to ensure there aren’t any unexpected reactions occurring during the printing process. If all goes well, volumetric 3D printers could be deployed to hospital settings or pharmacies to rapidly print medications on demand.

The teams true focus, however, is developing a process for individualized medications, customized to the patient. Because the process is nearly instant and creates tablets in numbers more suited for individual prescriptions, future doctors could mix compounds at will to produce medications suited to the individual. You could feasibly even create a single tablet which contains all of the prescriptions a particular patient needs in a single pill.

Source: https://www.syfy.com/

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