If we take a look at the pressing and prominent problems that the world is currently facing, be it political or health-related, what we must understand is that a person’s ideology or discipline is simply not enough to find the solution for it.
The world has developed and expanded in unforeseen ways, – we are now looking at events and occurrences that we could not even imagine. Game-changing innovations like artificial intelligence and machine learning have completely changed the projected trajectories of the future. With unlimited opportunities, comes unlimited growth, but also comes unlimited problems with limitless stances on how it could be solved. Expertise cannot exist singularly anymore; to come up with real-world solutions, it is important to channelise it in an integrative network. For example, a healthcare problem cannot simply be solved by a certain set of professionals- the proficiency of only doctors or clinicians or scientists are not sufficient to tackle the issue head-on. We must promote collaboration between all and even introduce the problem statement to say, entrepreneurs.
Recently, the problem of providing real-time training to doctors and nurses to deal with the trials and tribulations involved with dealing with emotions and reflexes of patients was solved by creating the concept of “patient-actors”. This can be seen as a perfect amalgamation of media sciences and medical care, something which would be previously termed unbelievable.
The inaugural Health in Translation event, hosted by Northeastern University’s Bouvé College of Health Sciences convened a wide range of people—including clinical professors, healthcare professionals, and researchers from disciplines across the university—to jumpstart collaboration in order to find novel solutions to grand health challenges. Jeffrey Cooper, who pioneered the field of patient safety and co-founded the Anesthesia Patient Safety Foundation, also attested to the power of collaboration when it comes to solving problems. They beautifully and simply stated, “This is where the proverbial rubber hits the road: When clinicians, engineers, entrepreneurs, innovators, and scientists work side-by-side to tackle the really vexing health challenges that we face”.
Sharanya Mathur
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