Impacts of the Technological Revolution on Health Care

Understanding the humanistic interaction with medical imaging technology

“…The unprecedented progress in medical imaging has led to an increasing dependence of the physician upon diagnostic technology (Attinger, 1984); in particular MR and CT may develop a culture of over-reliance on the imaging technology rather than human acumen (Postman, 1992;Reiser, 1978; The power and control that radiographers may `hold over patients' is partially legitimised since, in order to image the individual, the radiographer usually has to physically touch the patient to accurately identify the centring point. This fact is seen as a central feature of the social encounter, but surprisingly it is rarely mentioned in radiography (De Cann, 1988;Dowd, 1991).…”