As a physician I doubt this will have much of an impact on the cost of health care. The limiting factor here is not technological but cultural. In the majority

As a physician I doubt this will have much of an impact on the cost of health care. The limiting factor here is not technological but cultural. In the majority of patient encounters a diagnosis has either already been made or is obvious. In principle workers could be trained in the basic clinical skills required in a short period of time and several supervised by a single doctor. There are several reasons that this does not happen to a great extent: (i) Patient's prefer to be assessed by a fully qualified doctor (ii) Medicolegal - who is responsible if a mistake occurs? (iii) Trainee doctors on a per hour basis are often cheaper than employing other workers to perform the same tasks. (iv) For whatever reason Doctor's tend to see patients faster and make decisions more rapidly than other staff e.g. nurses performing the same tasks.