30 June 2021 – Fictions: Health and Care Re-Imagined

30^th June 2021, 16:00-17:00

Storytelling has been used throughout history to engage people’s imagination, to facilitate a sense of culture and community, to pass down tales about the past, and explore the possibilities of the future.

Fiction engages the brain in a different way to reading facts, can facilitate a better understanding of other people, and can help us see the world from different perspectives. It can be a way of opening conversations about difficult issues, taboos and stigma in a non-threatening way.

Over the course of one year starting in the summer of 2020, Future Care Capital has been running a series of highly successful fictional stories exploring the potential futures of health and social care through science fiction. This innovative approach was taken to inspire debate and new thinking among practitioners and policy-makers, and as a way of making ideas and realities of near-future technology more accessible to a wider audience.

This event presented an opportunity to reflect on the power of stories, and on the real-world issues and concerns addressed in our Fictions series.

What will you discover at the webinar?

The event will briefly refresh some of the key themes of the stories, including the use of algorithms to assess need; alternative and virtual realities in care; and the risks and possibilities of ‘cheating the system’ where artificial intelligence is employed.

The panel will then move into a wide-ranging discussion covering:

• The benefits of exploring these themes through fiction
• How to challenge thinking and accepted norms
• How is this perspective different to that of the “established” system and commentators, and what might be gained through more radical approaches?
• How feasible are these scenarios considering the technology available today?
• An exploration of the ethical concerns in relation to AI and technology in health and care
• How do we translate all of this thinking to policy?

Panelists:

• Josefine Magnusson, Senior Research Officer, Future Care Capital
• Keith Brooke, Editor and Contributing Author
• Anne Charnock, Contributing Author
• Liz Williams, Contributing Author
• Stephen Palmer, Author
• Vincent Chong, Artist