
Your.MD raises $10M to grow AI-driven health information service and marketplace - janober
https://techcrunch.com/2017/06/27/your-md-raises-10m
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nopinsight
It appears that the app uses some sort of pattern matching a la classic Siri.
I wonder how well it could respond to a relatively more complex query such as
"My 3 year old is sick with a temperature of 100 degrees she cant keep
anything down including liquids. What should I do?"

In the case that it can parse such questions, the big issue is whether it
knows what it doesn't know when giving recommendations.

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TeMPOraL
For a realistic example, drop the interpunction, capitalization, and throw a
dozen typos in there. Most regular people today seem to be unable to write a
straight sentence without making more errors than they wrote words.

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freyfogle
Here's a similar service which uses a combination of AI and actual licensed
doctors: [https://abi.ai](https://abi.ai)

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SirLJ
This one looks very cheap at few $ a month, how reliable is it? Do you have a
personal experience?

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freyfogle
Well I'm biased as I'm an angel investor in the business. It is like any price
- it is cheap if you use it heavily, expensive if you don't.

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SirLJ
OK, how about some independent user reviews or something? Do you know a place
where the service is being discussed? Couldn't find anything on the web with a
quick search by the company name...

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freyfogle
Well they just launched a week ago. I have used it and it works. Happy to put
you in touch with the founder if you like, or you could go ahead and risk €9

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SirLJ
Thanks, I'll wait, it is not about the money, but about the quality of
service, a wrong advice in this space could have a catastrophic results... One
last question, how many doctors are involved and do you have their bios online
somewhere?

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freyfogle
these questions are better directed at the team, not me. I am just an
investor. Bear in mind, you are getting health advice, not a medical
diagnosis, that would be impossible via a chat service.

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SirLJ
Thanks for your answers... personally I'll stick to HealthTap for now and
we'll see how this is going to unfold...

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danpalmer
How does this compare to NHS Direct in the UK? I'd have thought talking to a
chatbot that knows about services I could buy would be less good for my
overall healthcare than talking to a nurse or other trained medical
professional who can recommend me government provided health services. I'd be
concerned using this, that it would direct me to paid competitors to services
that would otherwise be free on the NHS (or equivalent in your country, if
you're outside the US).

I can see this becoming a great advertising platform for massages, and
"alternative" medical procedures like accupuncture or homeopathy, as these are
very often bought privately (since they often aren't covered by nationalised
health services as they are not always recognised as medecine).

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ealexhudson
Even if it compared well with NHS Direct, Doctors' opinions of that service
are very low - I've seen consultants joke regularly about "diagnosis by
telephone" on ward rounds frequently.

Although Doctors are expensive resources, they are very heavily utilized, and
are very good at what they do. That feels like a very hard problem to make any
genuine headway on.

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danpalmer
I agree that this is not a simple problem, but I'm concerned that a platform
for selling private medical services has the wrong incentives, particularly in
a country with nationalised healthcare.

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gedrap
Excuse my ignorance but how is it better than googling the symptoms and
eventually getting to cancer for pretty much any symptom? That's a serious
question, though. It's not suddenly you will be able to cure yourself and save
trip to doctor's office.

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gonmf
Maybe they calculate the likelihood of each health condition, using machine
learning. Most people on the internet would check the first two articles, read
and focus entirely on their ambiguous descriptions, and make up their mind.

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dragosmocrii
.md is a top level TLD belonging to Republic of Moldova. The more you know..

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soared
It seems like random countries/companies are benefiting just by chance from
these new TLDs. Sure .md is fine for Moldova to own, but it happens to be
perfect for medical tech and will be hugely profitable in the near future.

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dna_polymerase
Oh god no. People are already grinding their doctors gears thanks to webmd.
Those apps won't help. I needs a professional to look at things. In the end
this chat bot/ decision tree mashup will just make things worse.

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mistermann
Not everyone is fortunate to have a good doctor, and some doctors (mine, for
example) could learn something very valuable if they'd take a few minutes to
listen when their patients have done a lot of research on their own.

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daveguy
The problem is 1 out of 1000 patients will actually do _research_. The other
999 will google their symptoms, read whatever pops up in positions 1-5 and
think it is research.

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mistermann
Agreed, but it's a bit frustrating when a doctor actively ignores someone who
obviously has some valuable knowledge the doctor could benefit from. If they
are incapable of that, I question how they are capable of competently
diagnosing illnesses, which is a far more complicated task.

Granted, I'm writing from Canada, and while having free health care is lovely,
what's usually overlooked is that it is very often second or third rate care,
if you can even get it (free doesn't help much when there are multi-year
waiting lists).

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daveguy
Are there really multi-year waiting lists to see a doctor in Canada?
Specialists and new gp appts or all regular visits? Usually it's 2-6 mo for
new patients (specialist or popular gp) here in the US. I didn't think Canada
was much worse than that.

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a3camero
No. Many people are able to book visits with their family doctor (GP) on short
notice (e.g. next week). Walk-in clinics are available and you can see a
doctor within a couple hours, same-day, without an appointment (and without
being registered beforehand, literally just walk in). These doctors are fully
licensed.

Although it's not easy to find a good doctor that you like, there are family
doctors available for new patients even in busy cities like Toronto.
Specialists might take a while to book (assuming it's not serious). Emergency
rooms are always available (although you may have to wait a few hours if it's
not really time-sensitive). Labs can be booked same day and may have a bit of
a line up but you can get those for free too (for most types of tests).

