WE ALL know the tech world is moving incredibly fast and becoming more and more an essential part of our daily lives.
How many of us love our robot vacuums and basically unlimited access to music and movies.
Like in many fields in the world of physiotherapy technology is moving very quickly.
Instead of burying our heads in the sand and carrying on pretending it doesn’t exist, it’s important we analyse what’s out there and utilise what we think is appropriate.
In the clinic with the assistance of AI we have been able to progress treatment planning, reduce the workload of documentation and challenge our critical thinking and problem solving skills.
We will also soon have some very cool new tools and gadgets that are going to significantly improve our assessment skills, watch this space.
We have even had some proactive patients using AI tools to get ahead of their injury and starting their own exercises before they get in to see us.
However AI and tech can not completely take the place of human physiotherapists.
There are a few things that, at least in the near future, machines and computers are not able to provide.
Human connection: Assessment, diagnosis and recovery is not simply data driven and robotic. It requires trust, encouragement and understanding of the emotional experience of injury and recovery. There are many studies that support the link between recovery and relationship with the healthcare provider, there is an intrinsic human connection that is essential to effective healthcare.
Clinical judgement and intuition: There was a study that suggested that the most accurate detection of an underlying serious condition was not screening questions or assessment, it was the therapists experience of injury patterns and intuition. Or in short, gut feel. While AI is excellent at analysing large amounts of data and spotting patterns, it doesn’t have real-world experience or instinct.
Because AI deals very well with mass and patterned data it does not deal well with cases with any sort of complexity.
There is often more to pain and injury than what is directly in front of you and a human physiotherapist will know what questions to ask to uncover more answers.
Real patients often do not fit into standard treatment protocols and underlying influences of things like stress, anxiety, the realities of life and relationships, past history and even the physical requirements of living on the mountain (think weeding our gardens compared to weeding a garden on the coast) will significantly influence how we may tailor treatment.
The most obvious and extremely important part of treatment at Physique is hands-on techniques.
Assessment of tissue tone, range and joint stiffness and treatment with manual therapy of massage, joint mobilisations and stretch requires fine motor skills, sensitivity and nuance that develops with lots of training and experience.
Something the old massage gun is not going to replace.
Tech and AI is exciting, and there’s so many things that we can use to make our lives easier and ultimately more enjoyable but it cannot replace the human heart and clinical expertise that defines a physiotherapy experience.
Get in contact with us at Physique if you need the assistance and experience of a human.
