It does exactly what you're talking about. The quality is not good, but I don't know why anyone thinks the situation will improve. Countless careers have been wasted on expert systems, recommendation systems, and the like. The best minds doing this sort of thing will always be poached by wall street, where they still fail most of the time. However if it makes people feel better, most HMOs and managed care systems will start requiring their doctors to use such a system, if they don't already.
The problem is of expectations. We don't expect computers to write books (creativity is a Hard problem), but we do expect writers to use word processors.
Likewise, we shouldn't expect computers to deduce your ailment and prescribe treatment (critical thinking is also a Hard problem), but we should expect doctors to use computers to remember, search, and sort things for them: the things computers are good at.
We don't need the computer to think—we need it to help the doctor think. People should be working on that, not on systems to replace the doctors themselves.
I understand what you are saying but I'm an optimist at heart. I don't think careers were wasted because most of what's out there is not very good. This stuff is hard to solve but after seeing things like wolfram alpha I can't help but wonder if these systems will improve soon. As for startup attempting this, it's a long shot but those are the ones that make money.
