At first glance, the stack of medicine pumps might bear little resemblance to the flight deck of a modern aircraft. A series of white plastic boxes stacked on top of each other, they look similar to other pumps in a hospital that control the flow of drugs and fluids into the bloodstream of critically-ill patients.

Yet there is one crucial difference: these pumps — which can be used for insulin, painkillers and many other medications — are set up to take over important, safety-critical tasks that were once only undertaken by doctors and nurses.

Just as aircraft autopilots have improved overall airline safety by assuming control of tasks where human pilots can make errors, the pumps have been designed to conduct some of the arduous process of checking on dosage levels, patient identity and medical records that are required before any drug is administered. The hope is that they can process this information with fewer mistakes than humans.