The UAE’s healthcare providers are feeling the weight of ever-growing demands.
Caring for the country’s reasonably young demographic – who traditionally have fewer healthcare needs than their older counterparts – should, in theory, make things easier for medical personnel. In 2020, nearly 50 per cent of the UAE’s population was aged 15 to 35. However, a quickly growing overall population, and a growing older generation who have put down roots in the country, are creating huge demands among the healthcare sector looking to keep up. Â
A recent report on the Middle Eastern healthcare landscape predicts that the UAE will need an additional 15,000 nurses and allied health professionals in Abu Dhabi and 6,000 physicians and 11,000 nurses in Dubai by 2030.
But against this backdrop, as the population’s needs increase, so does the potential of an emerging ally – artificial intelligence (AI). The emergence of tools performing tasks with human-like intelligence has been dubbed ‘one of the most significant industrial revolutions of our time.’ One study suggests that AI could contribute over  $320 billion to the economy of Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. The economic contribution of AI is anticipated to grow by 20 per cent to 34 per cent annually, with the UAE and Saudi Arabia experiencing the highest growth rates.
In the healthcare sector, there are already examples of AI being used to improve disease diagnoses, treatment and prevention, from the doctors using it to analyse mammograms to detect 20 per cent more cancers, to those who have compared reams of data with electrical brain activity to match patients with the most suitable anti-depressant medication.
UAE leaders are taking note of these developments. The country’s National Artificial Intelligence Strategy 2031 places significant emphasis on the healthcare field while the Ministry of Health and Prevention (MoHAP) launched the UAE health sector’s first Centre of Excellence (COE) for AI in October 2023.
AI technologies can also speed up healthcare claims management and settlement, giving providers access to the working capital they need to grow faster and serve patients better.
As impressive as these use cases are, they will not fix current demand-side issues overnight. The adoption of these technologies will be a lengthy process that, among other things, will require aggressive education and skilling. At the same time, we cannot sit idle and cope. It is imperative to turn our focus to what we can improve now, and the ways AI can alleviate day-to-day workloads for medical staff, and by extension, provide more efficient care to patients.
The advancement of AI has created opportunities for healthcare providers to supplement the work of doctors, nurses and other healthcare staff who lack the hours in the day to juggle administrative tasks with caring for patients. AI can be interlaced within hospitals’ and clinics’ processes to proactively feed professionals patient information as they need it. This removes the need to run to the desk and scavenge through troves of information to figure out basic matters like meals and schedules, or complex treatment requirements. Instead, it can be at hand while a nurse or doctor is with a patient.
The conversational capabilities of a chatbot can also be deployed to handle frequently asked questions and every-day tasks for individuals before they even visit a doctor. For example, a patient could access basic information such as the time of their appointment and where it’s taking place, through to more nuanced topics such as typical wait times, the languages spoken by staff at the hospital, and any personal restrictions on a patient’s behaviour after the appointment’s taken place.
Providers can also add a layer of personalisation by integrating clinical decision support system and existing medical records into AI capabilities, allowing the technology to provide answers based on a patient’s history. In the event AI can’t solve a query, providers can automatically hand off to an agent, administrative staff member or clinician. By drawing upon the patient’s medical records, call history and voice-based sentiment, based on natural language processing (NLP), conversational AI can match them with the professional best suited to solve their query.
AI is not intended as a replacement for healthcare provided by professionals, nor is it intended to solve all queries. Its strength lies in acting as an intelligent assistant for healthcare professionals and administrators by handling calls that come to the front desk, and then elevating the patient experience through seamless service delivery. Embracing this technological frontier can alleviate strain, improve efficiencies, and ultimately ensure the well-being of the UAE’s population.
