Online Healthcare is a Game Changer

Could he be talking about how technology is going to radically improve the way we deliver and receive our healthcare? Does he see new technologies as being around the corner, and about to envelop us and help us improve our health? What does he really mean by "online care"?

Is it enough for us to communicate with our doctor on the Internet, or should we be becoming involved in online groups and counseling fellow patients? Should we have all of our medical records stored online, and be able to access them ourselves to make sure that they are correct.

You can get more info about online healthcare training course online also.

Education and Training OHSU

Should we be wearing electronic monitors of our heart, our breathing, and our temperature, all of which constantly transmit our vital signs in real-time to the database of our choosing? Or should we be undertaking robotic surgery using automated machines controlled by a surgeon hundreds of miles away?

Does this sound scary, or is it a form of "techno-utopia" that we should all be seeking? I can easily answer that one at least.

Techno-utopia, as defined by Wikipedia, is "a hypothetical ideal society, in which laws, government, and social conditions are solely operating for the benefit and well-being of all its citizens, set in the near- or far-future when advanced science and technology will allow these ideal living standards to existing; for example, post-scarcity, changes in human nature and the human condition, the absence of suffering and even the end of death." We are certainly not close to this.

In place of the static perfection of a utopia, others have envisioned online health as occurring in an "exotropia," an evolving open society allowing individuals and voluntary groupings to form the institutions and social forms they prefer. Perhaps the web 2.0 is the beginning of this exotropia?

We have to be careful not to be "techno-Utopians" – excessively, uncritically accepting of technologies. People like this don't tend to use new technologies as effectively as they could because they view the technologies as ends in themselves, not as tools. It is commonly held that using new technologies uncritically implies bad habits of the mind.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *