Greetings from the editorial team.
It gives me immense pleasure to share the release of the first issue of 2023 with all the support from the editorial team, reviewers, and authors of the Indian Academy of Oral Medicine and Radiology (IAOMR). In this editorial, I would like to share my view on the contribution of artificial intelligence (AI) in the specialty, which has made a sudden shift in paradigm in health care, and the use of AI in daily life is expanding exponentially.
AI is a field that combines computer science and robust datasets to enable problem-solving. AI was first coined by John McCarthy and defined as “the machines that can imitate human knowledge and behavior.”
There is no doubt that AI is rapidly evolving and growing sophisticated every day. Its application in business and society has already been established, and now, it is being increasingly researched to be applied in the field of health care.
There are various types of AI relevant to health care such as machine learning (ML)—neural networks and deep learning, natural language processing, rule-based expert systems, physical robots, and robotic process automation.[1] Most of the time, it is not a single technology that is used but a combination of one or more.
AI has proven to be a valuable tool to help clinicians and dentists reduce their workload. Its various applications include medical and dental imaging, diagnostics, decision-making, precision and digital medicine, drug discovery, treatment planning, prediction of treatment outcome, prediction of prognosis, and also hospital monitoring and robotic and virtual assistants.[2,3] Due to the need for precision and instant information, there is a demand for newer technologies, and hence, AI will always be considered a valuable tool for clinicians and researchers.
At the same time, we should be aware of the ethical concerns with AI. For effectively training the ML and improving the technology of AI in health care, sequences of algorithms need to be developed that requires large datasets. Here, the main concern is patient privacy, as the majority of people are uncomfortable sharing their data. The accuracy of the input data is the second important thing for the creation and calibration of predictive algorithms, as the decision taken by AI solely depends on the input data. Hence, the scarcity of real and accessible data is one of the obstacles to the progress of the development of AI in health care. Decisions that are taken by AI are subjective and based on associations, and sometimes, misinterpretations can occur due to the misconduct of an algorithm.
Another concern with AI is whether AI will replace jobs. There is a lot of research going on in healthcare systems such as digital information, radiology, and pathology, which suggests that AI performs better than humans.[1] However, when it comes to patient and doctor interaction, the role of AI becomes skeptical. Hence, we still believe that it will take many more years for AI to replace humans in the healthcare system.
Considering the potential and the limitations of AI, it is a comparatively lesser-researched area. There is a lot of scope for research in the field of AI and its application in health care, which requires an integrated approach between clinicians, researchers, and engineers.
I feel that AI is a new vista for exploration through interprofessional collaboration.
REFERENCES
1. Ding H, Wu J, Zhao W, Matinlinna JP, Burrow MF, Tsoi JK. Artificial intelligence in dentistry–A review. Front Dent Med 2023;4:9.
2. Chen YW, Stanley K, Att W. Artificial intelligence in dentistry:Current applications and future perspectives. Quintessence Int 2020;51:248–57.
3. Davenport T, Kalakota R. The potential for artificial intelligence in healthcare. Future Healthc J 2019;6:94–8.
