Forecast of shortage of 4.5 million nurses, in the future patients will be guided and given medicine by robots?

The global nursing industry is in crisis, with a projected shortage of 4.5 million nurses over the next decade. Robot technology is being seen as a potential solution to the problem.

Nurabot has a compartment that helps transport medication safely - Source: FOXCONN

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), about one-third of nurses have fallen into a state of burnout with symptoms of stress and mental exhaustion, leading to increased absenteeism.

To reduce pressure, Foxconn technology group (Taiwan) developed Nurabot - a nursing robot applying artificial intelligence AI.

According to CNN on September 12, Nurabot is designed to support repetitive or physically demanding tasks such as delivering medicine, transporting test samples, and guiding patients.

According to Foxconn, this robot can help reduce the workload for nurses by up to 30%.

“This is not about replacing nurses, but about completing the task with them,” emphasized the user design director of Foxconn company.

By taking over simple tasks, Nurabot frees nurses to perform more specialized tasks like patient care or assessing medical conditions.

Nurabot was developed over 10 months and began testing in April 2025 at the Lung, Face and Neck Department of Taichung Veterans Hospital. It is expected to be commercialized in early 2026.

On the technology side, Foxconn is collaborating with Kawasaki Heavy Industries (Japan) to develop hardware based on the “Nyokkey” serving robot model.

The Nurabot nursing robot is designed to assist health care workers with repetitive or physically demanding tasks in hospitals - Photo: CNN

Nurabot is capable of moving automatically on wheels, equipped with two arms to lift and hold objects, along with many cameras and sensors to recognize the environment.

Additionally, based on research into nurses' work habits and pain points—such as having to travel long distances to deliver samples—Foxconn added secure storage for medicines and test tubes.

Nurabot is powered by Foxconn’s Chinese language model, combined with Nvidia’s AI and robotics infrastructure (USA). This system allows the robot to orient itself, schedule tasks, and recognize speech and gesture signals.

The robot is also trained in a virtual hospital, which significantly shortens development time.

“AI allows Nurabot to perceive, reason and act in a human-like manner, while adapting its behavior based on each patient and specific circumstances,” said David Niewolny, Nvidia’s director of medical development.

Although Nurabot is expected to bring many benefits, Professor Rick Kwan, Deputy Dean of Nursing at Tung Wah University (Hong Kong), said that this technology still has many obstacles.

Patients still prefer direct communication with nurses, cramped hospital infrastructure makes it difficult for robots, and strict standards for safety, ethics, and data security are needed.

“We need to take a slow, cautious approach, with careful testing and evaluation,” he said.

Robots in medicine are not a new concept. Surgical robotic systems like the da Vinci have been assisting doctors for decades.

In Singapore, Changi Hospital is using more than 80 robots to assist doctors and nurses with everything from administrative work to dispensing medicine.

In the US, nearly 100 autonomous robots “Moxi” developed by Diligent Robots (Texas) are also transporting medicine, samples and supplies in hospitals.

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Source: https://tuoitre.vn/du-bao-thieu-4-5-trieu-y-ta-tuong-lai-benh-nhan-se-duoc-robot-huong-dan-phat-thuoc-20250913140202596.htm