“Thanks To ObamaCare, A 20,000 Doctor Shortage Is Set To Quintuple”
— Forbes
The United States is running out of doctors.
According to the Association of American Medical Colleges, we will need about 875,000 doctors by 2020.
With a growing aging population, that number will be short by about 91,000 doctors by 2020… and 130,600 understaffed by 2025.
There are just too many patients and not enough doctors. Consequently, doctors are spread too thin and are unable to keep up with their caseloads.
At the same time, patients, especially in remote areas, are unable to get the quality care they need…
There is a solution: robots.
I’ve discovered a small, little-known company that will help solve the doctor shortage — and save lives in the process.
It will do this by using a machine that allows doctors to visit patients from anywhere in the world… and they can do it in minutes in their pajamas.
Dr. Robot
The robot stands five feet tall and has a large computer screen that projects the doctor’s face.
It is armed with patients’ digital medical records, a state-of-the-art navigation system, and a full arsenal of medical equipment, including a digital stethoscope, otoscopes (used to look in ears), and an ultrasound imaging system.
When a doctor wants to visit a patient, he doesn’t even need to set foot in the hospital…
Simply by pushing a button on his iPad, the doctor can send the hospital-based robot to the patient’s room. It moves by itself and has sensors to keep it from bumping into walls.
A two-way video allows the doctor and the patient to see and speak with each other; and with a zoom feature, the doctor can read the patient’s chart, see his reflexes, and even check his eyes for dilated pupils.
In other words, the robot allows the doctor to examine the patient as if he or she were in the room, and then determine the right course of action.
It is particularly useful for stroke victims, for whom every second counts.
This is very cool stuff…
The robot allows doctors to visit multiple hospitals and check on patients who could be thousands of miles apart. This technology truly breaks down geographic boundaries and provides expert health care to all parts of the country.
According to the Washington Post:
Dignity Health, which runs Arizona, California, and Nevada hospitals, began using the telemedicine machines five years ago to diagnose patients suspected of suffering strokes — when every minute is crucial to prevent serious brain damage.
The San Francisco-based health care provider now uses the telemedicine robots in emergency rooms and intensive-care units at about 20 California hospitals, giving them access to specialists in areas such as neurology, cardiology, neonatology, pediatrics and mental health.
Regardless of where the patient is located, we can be at their bedside in several minutes,” said Dr. Alan Shatzel, medical director of the Mercy Telehealth Network.
“Literally, we compress time and space with this technology. No longer does distance affect a person’s ability to access the best care possible.”
FDA Says, “Go!”
Here’s the best part: The company just received FDA approval for their hospital robots.
And get this: This small, little-known company is the only one to have the approval of the FDA, giving them a virtual monopoly on this technology.
Already they’ve dispatched robots to 20 hospitals, including UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles.
But this is only the beginning…
There are over 5,700 hospitals in the United States, 69,105 in China, and a total of 300,000 worldwide.
The growth potential is massive.
And each robot doctor costs about $5,000.
According to the most recent conference call, the reception to the robots has been positive — especially with the navigation capabilities and the ease of use with the iPad. And the company has plans to expand into other, non-medical businesses.
Make no mistake; the future we all were led to believe would happen one day when we got old… is happening as we speak.
There is money to be made as robots change the way the world works.
Christian DeHaemer
Check us out on YouTube!Christian is the founder of Bull and Bust Report and an editor at Energy and Capital. For more on Christian, see his editor’s page.
