4 Chatbots Changing The Way We Approach Healthcare
Medical chatbots are a tool to help individuals who may have question about their health but don’t want to take a trip to the doctor to get those questions answered. Medical chatbots have only just started to be widely accepted tools, but they aren’t a new idea.
More than 50 years ago, there was EILZA — a program written for an IBM 7094 that mimicked Rogerian psychology. Essentially, this computer program asked patients questions by rearranging the statement the patient had said. While it was just emulating conversation and not a traditional AI, in the mid 1960s, when Eliza was active, she might as well have been science fiction.
As more and more chatbots make their ways into the healthcare industry, they could be used to answer unique patient questions, if not outright prescribe medication. For now, though, here are some healthcare-related chatbots quickly changing the way we approach healthcare.
1. Florence Chat
Florence may be a simple chat bot, but it’s an invaluable tool for anyone who forgets to take their medication. This simple Facebook-based chatbot, which can also be used through Skype and Kik, requires the patient input their medication, how many times they need to take it, and what time it needs to be taken. Once the bot has that information, it is able to send out correctly timed messages to remind you to take your medications.
The most recent update to the chatbot also added a refill reminder to help you remember when you need to refill your medication so you don’t run out.
2. Your.MD
If you’re looking for a personal health assistant, you definitely want one that can learn and grow as it is used. Your.MD is an AI-based health assistant that can help answer questions and make recommendations based on the symptoms you put into the app.
This application works across multiple platforms — in addition to Android and iOS for phones, it can also be added to Facebook Messenger, Kik, Slack, Telegram and Skype, making it accessible for everyone no matter what type of technology they have.
This application is being marketed as “pre-primary care” — enabling patients to have their questions answered without making a doctor’s appointment. The app only offers frequently asked questions and suggestions based on the symptoms listed and does not claim to be a replacement for actual medical advice. Instead, it’s used as a tool to provide information that might not require a doctor’s appointment to obtain.
3. Babylon Health
How much time have you spent on the phone with the receptionist at your local doctor’s office trying to figure out the kind of appointment you need? What if a chatbot could replace that phone call by helping you determine the type of help you need and even connecting you with doctor’s appointments via telemedicine?
That’s exactly what Babylon Health does. This UK-based program uses a chatbot to answer questions and assess symptoms. If you do need to make an appointment with a doctor, the app can even connect you with 1 out of 100 doctors that work with the Babylon Health program. While this isn’t exclusively a chatbot, it relies on the chatbot program to help patients while weeding out those who don’t need to see the doctor but just need to have some questions answered.
4. MedWhat
People tend to turn to Google when they’ve got a question about their health, but unfortunately that can result in someone diagnosing themselves incorrectly because of the results that follow their search. For medical questions, MedWhat is quickly becoming one of the smartest AI programs on the market today.
Created by Stanford University researchers, MedWhat can answer questions concerning general health, symptoms, drug interactions and everything in between. This anonymous chatbot program can save you from a trip to the doctor or a lengthy phone call if all you need to know is whether or not your prescription is going to interact with another medication you take.
Chatbots will never be a replacement for medical advice from a professional, but they can be a great tool to help answer questions, even if all you want to know is whether or not you need to take a trip to your local doctor’s office. These chatbots are changing the way we look at healthcare, and they are only going to get more advanced as machine learning algorithms continue to improve over the coming years.
Image by Jack Moreh
