It’s always tempting to consider AI and other digital health technologies as, in essence, what happens in cultures that are already technologically advanced such as Western Europe and the United States.
In many ways, however, the really interesting, and truly revolutionary, applications lie in other parts of the world.
For example, in a recent commentary, Jalil Allabadi, CEO of Altibbi, a digital health platform based in the United Arab Emirates, argues that AI lies at the center of a trend that will transform healthcare across large stretches of the MENA (Middle East North Africa) region, where distance and community isolation remains a serious impediment to effective healthcare.
“In my opinion,” he says, “AI has the substantial potential of improving healthcare in large communities in the MENA region especially in Egypt and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA). Both countries are in dire need of proper healthcare systems where citizens, especially the underprivileged, can access affordable and effective high-quality medical care.”
The end goal, he says, is to tap AI and other digital health tools to improve population health management by “eventually leading to more informed healthcare diagnosis and high-quality recommendations” by doctors and patients alike.
For example, Allabadi says, chronic diseases such as diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular disease kill around 1.7 million people annually in the Eastern Mediterranean region, primarily “due to unhealthy lifestyles common in these countries, which include poor eating habits, lack of physical exercise and stress.”
According to Allabadi, recent studies his company have conducted reveal that Upper Egypt, for example, faces “a critical lack of access to basic healthcare, while Saudi Arabia has many challenges including the availability of sufficient continuous financial support to execute, operate, and maintain the telehealth ecosystem, and the remuneration of its services.”
Still, telehealth and other digital technologies incorporating AI are “starting to be perceived as a vital ingredient in enhancing the healthcare infrastructure in the Middle East, assuring significant improvements for patients and medical practitioners. (They hold) the key to solving the most pressing issues including medical care access and efficient medical consultations.”
In the end, he says, with greater efforts by government and healthcare entities to integrate technology into revamping healthcare infrastructure, “the healthcare ecosystem should witness further improvement in the near future.”