TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT

Positive Effects of Technology Development on People's Health over the Past 30 Years

Positive Effects of Technology Development on People's Health over the Past 30 Years

The affect of advancements in technology is seen almost in every field of life but it has made vital advancements in medical sciences. Technological advancements in the field of health care are used to increase the span and quality of life or to maintain it, to eliminate or decrease pain and to reduce the threat of diseases. It is done through study, diagnosis, treatment and prevention of sickness (Jernigan 2009, p. 20). In all of these steps technological development is involved and plays an immense role. Illustrations of development in health technology include innovative procedures involving surgeries (e.g. angioplasty, angiography, psychotherapy), drugs (e.g. antibiotics, aspirin), equipments used by doctors (e.g. ultra sound machines, MRI machines, X ray machines), biologics (e.g. gene therapies, antibodies), diagnostic tests: (e.g. blood test for diabetes, blood test for HIV), innovative support systems (e.g., electronic record of patient and its electronic transmission, telemedicine system) and organizational and managerial systems (e.g., diabetes management program, billing and accounting) (Moseley 2005, p. 35). The association of technology with human health and medicine is very old but it is just in the recent years that development in technology has immensely affected human health in a positive way. Earlier in this century, there was very little technology used in the field of medicine. It was just after the invention of X-ray machine that scientists started putting their efforts in creating technological equipments (Winter 1990, p 5-10). Earlier technology was only applied to treat or prevent diseases. But nowadays technology is there in every feature of medicine from collecting data of patient to diagnosis of a disease and then to surgery. It is through the advancement in technology that helped doctors solve the problems which they had to face during surgeries and analyzing the disease. Earlier as they had little or no technological assistance, they were unable to solve the problem which resulted in more complexities in patients' health. Also, peoples' health is benefitted through technology as the previous record of another patient can be utilized for giving better solution to cure the new patient having the same disease. As in the US, the most important reason of death is heart disease and heart attack as one of its consequence. The treatment and prevention from heart diseases can ...