Friday, June 06, 2014
Medicine and Science
To the extent that medicine is a science, we don’t need
doctors.
If, when feeling ill, one could stick a finger in a machine
and learn with scientific certainty the diagnosis and best treatment, there
would be nothing for a doctor to do.
With biological science having grown greatly over the years,
it should therefor follow that the need for doctors would decrease.
Evidence of that appeared in an article appearing in the May
31 issue of The Boston Globe under the headline “A new source for the old house
call.” The article reported a plan by
EasCare LLC, a Dorchester, MA ambulance company, to make its Emergency Medical
Technicians (EMTs) available to provide in-home care for “patients with
infections, minor wounds, injuries from falls, and problems associated with
chronic diseases like diabetes and congestive heart failure.”
When you think about it, it makes a lot of sense. If we can rely on EMTs to care for us in life-threatening
events like heart attacks, strokes, and car accidents, surely it is reasonable
to look to them for treatment of more minor complaints.
Scientific progress has made it feasible, both by adding to
the certainty of diagnosis and best treatment and also by making information
more readily available for the use of both caregivers and those responsible to
supervise them.
