YOUR PATIENT IS NOT JUST A DATA
YOUR PATIENT IS NOT JUST A DATA
Your patient is not just a DATA
In the present day of any practice for a doctor the most important thing is not only knowledge and skill but also DATA!
Now most doctors have some knowledge about their previous patients, so some amount of data is already there! But for a new patient, this is not so! Which is why this is important!
In the book Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow, Yuval Noah Harari argues that all competing political or social structures can be seen as data processing systems: "Dataism declares that the universe consists of data flows, and the value of any phenomenon or entity is determined by its contribution to data processing" and "we may interpret the entire human species as a single data processing system, with individual humans serving as its chips.
Now as far as a computer is concerned, the moment you are registered in a clinic or a hospital you are simply a data unit. It does not confirm that you are a male or female or whether you are of that particular country! For the computer you are simply a number!
Most clinics assign you a MRD or medical records department number and that is how the hospital recognizes you as long as you are associated with it!
Even in the counter you are called by a number which is the token number given to you! Then when you get the reports you are asked for your registration number!
When you go for medications then your number is linked to the medicines and you are given according to the DATA in the system!
As far as the computer records department is concerned you are simply a member of the homo sapiens with a number!
Finally when you get the bill you are asked for your number and in fact your number is generated only when you pay the bill! You are literally paying a computer to make you a data! You are literally asking a machine to treat you like a machine!
In many large hospitals even the allotment of beds and surgery dates sometimes are based on protocols which are based on data!
The organ donation and list is actually a big data of numbers where allotment is done not on the basis of your name or sex but on the basis of your DATA and of course number!
In any tragedy or triage, the data is color instead of number but the treatment remains the same! You are a member of a color, and it is the color which decides when you will be taken care of!
At the end of it all, finally after all that data and number and colors! You reach your doctor's chamber and he or she asks you, "What is your problem?" Remember that it is one of the few places where you are not just a data or a color or a number; but a human with a problem which another human doctor is trying to solve!
With all the technology flying around all over us, many patients feel better with just a human touch and empathy! Till that is the case then rest assured, DATAISM stays out of the Doctor's chamber!
Dr. Sriram Nathan