Computer science has a major affect on medicine from sorting through information to bioinformatics to artificial intelligence, and computer simulation. As a wealth of medical technology and data become available to medical professionals, the task of sorting through the information is becoming more and more difficult. Advanced computer technology is applied to help relieve the burden of sorting through this information. When I speak of technology, I don't mean hardware. I am referring to the software techniques of Bayesian networks, case-based reasoning, and theoretic decision-planning. Artificial intelligence techniques are also used to evaluate clinical symptoms and the possible tests and treatments. Artificial intelligence promises to lower costs while providing more effective care. These techniques have been applied to the diagnosis of gallbladder disorders, deep vein thrombosis and, most recently, mammography. The mammography analysis best illustrates the promise of the new technology.

In the 1990s companies wanted to merge biology with computer science to create a new b

to 98,000 Americans die each year because of medical errors. Medical errors may rank as the eighth leading cause of death. Properly designed clinical information systems have the potential to detect and to prevent medical errors. At the same time, clinical information systems that are not adequately designed, implemented, and evaluated have the potential to cause harm to

be used proactively to change behavior that results in errors or post hoc to assign blame and

Computer simulations may also reduce the number and size of human trials that a company has to conduct on the way to a drug's approval by the Food and Drug Administration. The simulations can indicate the most efficient trial designs to reveal beneficial effects. Some computer models that simulate how drugs are broken down in the body can predict the most effective dose. Greater advantages could result if biomedical researchers combine the models they're developing. By hooking together models of several different diseases the chances of detecting side effects or spotting dangerous drug interactions could increase. For example, heart disease, obesity, and diabetes tend to occur in the same patients so it would be useful to model all those ailments at the same time. Researchers are combining individual computer models of genes, proteins, cells, organs, and metabolic pathways. With such a set of coordinated models medical scientists might see effects of disease that are hidden by the complexity of the human body. <

Some topics in this essay:
Bioinformatics Bioinformatics, Institute Medicine, ESSAY Write, Drug Administration, information systems, medical errors, computer simulations, virtual patients, clinical information systems, computer science, sorting information, computer simulation, prevent errors, artificial intelligence, clinical information, cells organs metabolic, efforts prevent errors, organs metabolic pathways, prevent medical errors,