This paper discusses the key role medical regulators have in setting standards for doctors who use artificial intelligence (AI) in patient care. Given their mandate to protect public health and safety, it is incumbent on regulators to guide the profession on emerging and vexed areas of practice such as AI. However, formulating effective and robust guidance in a novel field is challenging particularly as regulators are navigating unfamiliar territory. As such, regulators themselves will need to understand what AI is and (...) to grapple with its ethical and practical challenges when doctors use AI in their care of patients. This paper will also argue that effective regulation of AI extends beyond devising guidance for the profession. It includes keeping abreast of developments in AI-based technology and considering the implications for regulation and the practice of medicine. On that note, medical regulators should encourage the profession to evaluate how AI may exacerbate existing issues in medicine and create unintended consequences so that doctors (and patients) are realistic about AI’s potential and pitfalls when it is used in health care delivery. (shrink)

In the context of the writings of Śaṅkarācārya.

Overtreatment refers to interventions that do not benefit the patient, or where the risk of harm from the intervention is likely to outweigh any benefit the patient will receive. It can account for up to 30% of health care costs, and is increasingly recognised as a widespread problem across nations and within clinical and scientific communities. There are a number of inter-related factors that drive overtreatment including the expanding definition of diseases, advertising and the influence of the pharmaceutical industry, how (...) doctors are trained and remunerated, demands from patients and the fear of complaints leading doctors to practise defensively.This paper discusses a number of ethical and practical issues arising from overtreatment that doctors and patients should be aware of. It also considers the flow-on effects of overtreatment such as the increased cost of care, increase in work load for health professionals, and wastage as resources are diverted from more genuine and pressing needs. In addition, there are references to a number of Medical Council of New Zealand statements about what good medical practice means in an environment of resource limitation. The paper concludes with a few measures that doctors and patients could take to reduce overtreatment but acknowledges that health care is extremely complex so it would be unrealistic to eliminate overtreatment entirely. (shrink)

v. 1. pt. 1. Babaji's glimpses of the Tamil 18 Siddhas. pt. 2. [non-Roman data].

In the present world order unbridled forces of free market capitalism are frequently cited for much of the social injustice, inequity, and disparity of wealth between the rich and the poor. Although history''s verdict in favor of the free markets could hardly be harsher or clearer, it is clear that after the initial wave of triumph, the free market paradigm has developed some cracks in its façade. What marks the trail of such sustained and pronounced move toward free markets in (...) terms of ethics, morality, social welfare and social justice? How does one keep a social score in this seemingly relentless and irreversible move all over the world toward free market capitalism?In this paper we shall attempt to address these and related questions. Drawing on concepts from organization theory and social philosophy and using publicly available financial information, we shall illustrate how, amidst the myriad and mixed noises, some sense of order and signal can be discerned in addressing issues of equity and social justice. Toward this end, first, we provide a broad contrast between two models of financial markets: the command model and the free market model and proceed to examine publicly available financial information and analyze the trends and patterns with graphical representations using publicly available data from Handbook of International Economic Statistics. Next, we explore the implications of financial performance measures for social welfare and social justice and discuss the social perils of free markets using the Mexican and Asian Financial crises as the focal points. Finally, we present a set of recommendations for smoother structural transition. (shrink)