Adoption of AI in Indian healthcare sector faces several challenges: Economic Survey

Adoption of artificial intelligence in the Indian healthcare sector faces several challenges including lack of specialised talent data complexities and difficulties in scaling up and requires attention going forward the Economic Survey 202425 tabled in Parliament flagged on FridayThe National Strategy for Artificial Intelligence 2018 developed by NITI Aayog discussed how AI could help address the challenges of quality accessibility and affordability for a large section of the populationThe strategy emphasised how AI combined with robotics and the Internet of Medical Things IoMT can potentially become the new nervous system for healthcare providing solutions to address healthcare problems and helping the government achieve universal health for all the report statedAccording to NASSCOM the widespread adoption of AI in healthcare can create new opportunities for the sector and bridge the accessibility affordability and quality gapsAdoption of AI can help reduce drug discovery and delivery costs it can improve the quality of medical devices improve diagnosis accuracy and enable realtime monitoring of remote patients For healthcare providers AI helps streamline the overall patient journey assists clinicians in reducing misdiagnoses and enables personalised treatments and preventive care the report saidPresenting one of the use case examples of how AI can efficiently deliver services and enhance the accessibility of healthcare for citizens the report mentioned how the Rajasthan state government has set a new benchmark in public health management of Silicosis a debilitating lung disease caused by inhaling silica dust which is widespread in the state due to sandstone mining activitiesThe state government is effectively using digital Xrays teleradiology and AI to streamline the diagnosis of SilicosisThe technology was developed by training an AI model on a vast dataset of overlabelled chest Xrays By leveraging AI technology the government enabled the automatic detection of the disease making the diagnostic process faster and more accurate the report saidThis technology has significantly improved the identification and treatment of Silicosis patientsThe government also introduced DBT selfapproval portal which allows diagnosed patients to receive financial assistance directly into their bank accounts bypassing the previously cumbersome administrative proceduresThis system ensures that those affected by Silicosis receive timely relief the report statedSilicosis is associated with severe comorbidities such as tuberculosis cancer ischemic heart disease bronchitis and infections from bacteria and fungiAnother example of technology integration in health care is the eSwasthya Dham portal launched by the Uttarakhand government the report mentionedThis portal helps monitor Char Dham Yatra pilgrims Yamunotri Gangotri Kedarnath and Badrinath health parameters and offers a variety of benefits for pilgrims including the ability to generate an ABHA in under two minutesCreating the ABHA helps provide a reliable and secure identity for devotees enabling them to manage their health records digitally This system will also ensure prompt assistance for citizens in case of emergencies the report saidAs a result it facilitates the smooth journey of pilgrimsDespite its great potential AI adoption in India is still in its early stages the report highlighted adding in 2023 34 per cent of healthcare organisations in India were piloting AI projects and 16 per cent had moved their generative AI initiatives into productionHowever the adoption of AI in the Indian healthcare sector faces several challenges including a lack of specialised talent both technical and domainspecific data complexities and difficulties in scaling up This requires attention going forward the report saidThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever