The Future of Robot Caregivers
by Laasya Aki
In the future, the care of patients could be placed in the hands of robot nurses. Many technological companies are creating prototypes of robot caregivers. Today, these machines already exist as a medium to help patients move around or deliver medicine.
Due to modern medicine and advancements in medical technology, the senior population in many countries is predicted to substantially increase. The care of seniors is currently entrusted to paid caregivers, whose profession is difficult to fill. This is because of the large risk of injury, physical demand, low wages, and limited benefits. The number of drawbacks has discouraged many potential caregivers, and has created a shortage of workers. Robot caregivers could be a solution to this shortage.
These robots possess the physical strength necessary to assist an elder, and do not possess a large risk of injury. Also, the robot will not suffer from fatigue or stress if needed to work overtime and their sole purpose is to care for the elderly. While the benefits of these machines are numerous, there are drawbacks as well. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is an important part of many human and technological interactions. Human caregivers can interact genuinely with other humans. AI technology is currently not advanced enough to replicate human emotions and flawlessly implement these techniques.
Another quality that humans possess over robots is the ability to make ethical and logical decisions. The human brain can easily assess situations based not only on sense, but other factors like facial expressions or tone. Caregivers and nurses can make ethical judgments and determine the degree of benefit of an option whereas robots are limited to “yes” or “no” actions, based on encoded information. As put in an article by Standord, “if a robot is programmed to remind its patients to take their medicine, it needs to know what to do if the patient refuses. On one hand, refusing the medicine will harm the patient. On the other hand, the patient may be refusing for a number of legitimate reasons that the robot may not be aware of. For instance, if the patient feels ill after taking the medicine, then insisting on administering the medicine may turn out to be harmful” (2). A human caregiver would be able to figure out the problem easily, compared to a robot.
Robot caregivers have many benefits that cannot be ignored. Because AI technology has not reached its full potential yet, these machines cannot exist on their own. Though, this technology can assist human caregivers with their tasks. One day, robot nurses could replace human nurses altogether.
~ Edited by Christian Mueth
References:
- https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2017/10/04/americans-attitudes-toward-robot-caregivers/
- https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs201/projects/2010-11/ComputersMakingDecisions/robotic-nurses/index.html
This article was originally published at the Teach-Technology Organization, Inc. online technology blog. I volunteer as a tech blog writer at this organization, which is dedicated to bridging the gap between seniors and technology. You can read this article (and many more) at the Teach Technology site.
tags: TeachTech - technology