There are a lot of different actual and potential applications for artificial intelligence in dentistry. Actual because there are already products on the market being used by dental practitioners right now, but potential because it is a fast moving area with endless possibilities where artificial intelligence could provide solutions.
Machine learning algorithms are able to detect dental caries and periodontal disease by assessing radiographs. Does this help to solve some of the issues of variability in diagnosis that we discussed in last week’s episode with Tim Keys? There is an opportunity to improve treatment decisions too, and this information might help guide patients to assess options as part of the informed consent process. And artificial intelligence could simplify the process of creating dental record entries and automate some of the back office business process in a dental practice.
The power of artificial intelligence lies in the ability to train on large data sets, and apply objective criteria to overcome some of the subjectivity of clinical judgement in both the diagnostic and treatment planning phases of the patient journey. This isn’t without risk, because the algorithms are only as good as the evidence base (and the program developers) used to train them.
This comes back to the question of how we make decisions, and how much we should trust our own decision making. In epidemiological research, we know that when dental practitioners do repeat clinical examinations on the same group of patients at two different time points, they will disagree with their own decisions some of the time - so not only does variability exist between practitioners, but also within practitioners. It’s important to understand and acknowledge this variability exists, in the interests to trying to improve patient outcomes. There is a body of evidence that supports the use of rule-based protocols over human intuitive judgement, but that presupposes that we have appropriate protocols to guide decision making in dentistry. This is one of the key challenges for developers to overcome.
In this episode of the Dental as Anything podcast I speak to Dr Max Ganhewa, co-founder of CoTreatAI to discuss how artificial intelligence is currently being used, where it might offer advantages, and some of the pitfalls to be aware of.
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Previous Episodes
Episode 1: Mouthwash
Episode 2: Ethics, professionalism and the imagination
Episode 3: Public dental funding lacks teeth, but is change coming?
Episode 4: If in doubt, fill ... dogma, myths and clinical judgement in caries management.
How will artificial intelligence change dentistry?