As a result of the pandemic, the number of digital healthcare tools used to help aid patients virtually has increased, one of these tools are healthcare chatbots. Some of the benefits of healthcare chatbots are that they can save patients time, reduce the administrative load and can free time up for the clinician.
What are chatbots?
Chatbots use Natural Processing Language (NPL) which is a branch of Artificial Intelligence. Healthcare chatbots analyze frequently asked questions that patients might have and then respond based on keywords and patterns the chatbot is trained on.
What are some use cases of chatbot in healthcare?
Chatbots have been used to communicate FAQs regarding information about COVID-19 and necessary information clients need to know before entering the hospital (i.e. wear a mask, don’t bring a visitor, be aware of your symptoms if you have travelled in the last 14 days). This can help to reduce the need for humans to be at risk, communicating this information to clients entering the hospital.
Chatbots have also been used for scheduling appointments, this can be far more efficient than having to wait on hold for hours and hours, instead, the chatbot can book, cancel and send reminders for medical appointments through a secure platform.
Another benefit of chatbots is that they can help to reduce patient no-shows, I talked about the risk for patients in this blog post and how this can lead to increased adverse effects for patients who consistently miss appointments. Also, they can help patients remember to take their medication and remind them of upcoming healthcare appointments.
What are the risks of chatbots in healthcare?
We cannot ignore the risks that might be associated with using chatbots in healthcare such as the potential for privacy and security breaches. This is an issue many healthcare organizations are facing, we have to always be mindful of health data being shared and the risks associated with this.
If we want these chatbots to be the first line of primary care we have to make sure they are reliable and that physicians have trust in the technology. Some of these chatbots are built based on black-box models that house vendor-specific algorithms and it’s important that clinicians have a good understanding of the tool. There has to be some monitoring aspect of these chatbots, the worst-case situation would be if incorrect medical information is communicated to the patient and this results in a negative event for the patient.
What is the future of chatbots in healthcare?
Chatbots could play a key role in the consistent rollout of the vaccine by reminding individuals when it is time for their second dose of the vaccine, as well as, keeping track of individuals who have had their first dose. In addition, chatbots can help to reduce the administrative load in hospitals and clinics by using the chatbot as the first line of primary care to address FAQs, instead of having receptionists tied up on the phone.
Chatbots can potentially be the first line of primary care and therefore, it is important that these chatbots are further developed to recognize the emotions behind what patients type. This can be done using sentiment analysis, if the chatbot can recognize a negative tone from the user, this can trigger a direct link to their primary care physician, instead of angering the user further. This will be important when managing the patient’s experience with the chatbot. In addition, it is great to get feedback from patients on how they felt about using the chatbot, in the form of a survey, for further improvements.
Comment down below, where do you see chatbot having the biggest impact in healthcare?
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