Will Elon Musk destroy emergency medicine as we know it?

[GoldenGulag49]

I was thinking about how autonomous driving may drastically decrease road accidents in the future. Obviously this is a good thing, but does anyone think it will significantly erase the demand for emergency medicine physicians?

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[Michael_Scott]

lol...you will still see people come in with stuff stuck in their butt with reasoning like "i just sat on it" ...

 

[Tenk]

You ever been in a tesla? It's far from perfect.

 

[Vocoded Super Saw]

Not when a good chunk of my night shift is old people falling on their way to the bathroom, healthy kids with crazy parents that think a "fever" of 99 is a 3am emergency, and drunk people wanting a place to crash.

 

[TooMuchResearch]

No.

 

[Frazier]

When you do your first shift in the ED, you'll get your answer OP.

If you already did shifts... didn't you notice the board has something like only 1 out of 20 being mva's?

If that mva patient didn't exist, the room would still be filled with someone else from the waiting room.

 

[KinesiologyNerd]

Smart cars aren't going to eliminate stupid people.

 

[alpinism]

I was thinking about how autonomous driving may drastically decrease road accidents in the future. Obviously this is a good thing, but does anyone think it will significantly erase the demand for emergency medicine physicians?

This has already happened.

Due to car safety advancements over the past 30 years nowadays we see significantly fewer severe traumatic injuries from MVAs.
Ironically demand has increased over the same time period largely due to EM changing from a field providing 24/7 emergency care to providing 24/7 primary care.

 

[Zebra Hunter]

MVC related issues account for between 1-2% of ER presentations. I think we'll be fine.

 

[sum dude]

I thought this was a response to AI taking over doctors roles. I thoroughly welcome AI combing through charts in the ED to work-up nebulous flank pain, tweakers, confused elderly people, kids with fevers who don't have fevers, 1 year of emergent abdominal pain w/ L sided tingling on the insides of both legs, chest pain 2 days after last stress test, the SIRS patient without a source, the 60 mph MVA asking for pain meds, and the old fake vomiting to get a work note crowd. Logic checks at the door when they enter our world.

Fortunately, stupidity trumps even AI and self driving cars