Technology in Healthcare Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Technology in Healthcare - Essay Example Certainly, medical technology has been useful over the years with profound breakthroughs being achieved but there needs to be an understanding of the impact of technology in healthcare- both positive and negative effects and how the latter can be mitigated. Technology is being adopted in healthcare to develop new treatments for previously untreatable diseases, major progress in clinical ability to treat acute ailments, increase access to healthcare to the patient population, making improvements in existing capabilities and promote efficient delivery of services. Medical technology has been used as a restricted substitute to a treatment, a substitute for an existing treatment or a supplement to an existing treatment. These changes are important to note as they affect the cost of treatment as they determine whether the technology raises or lowers the initial cost of treatment (Prantel). The field of medicine largely uses a number of types of medical technology or is affected by new technology and this had been evidenced for instance by the reduction in overall mortality rate from the heart attack between 1980 and 2000 as the number fell by approximately half. Another instance is with treatment of pre-term babies where in the 1950s it was almost impossible to provide this treatment but by the 1990s, there had been advances in technology; for example, it became possible to have steroids for the mother and/or baby and artificial pulmonary surfactant started being used to help infant's lungs develop. These advances in technology reduced mortality by a third of what it was in the 1950s (â€Å"Snapshots: How Changes†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ). Primarily technology use in healthcare has been opposed for its high-cost implications. However, from the graph above digitizing healthcare is forecasted to save the healthcare approximately 400 billion and 150 billion dollars inpatient and outpatient costs cumulatively by 2018 respectively.  Ã‚