PATIENT ENGAGEMENT WITH AI
Publication date: April 05, 2024
Conversational AI and AI powered video bots for health education
On March 19th 2024 the lawyers of KIELTYKA GLADKOWSKI took part in the workshop devoted to the use of AI in patient engagement.
The workshop focused on the utilization of artificial intelligence (AI) in patient care and was led by Lawrence Byrd, Senior Director of Communications APIs at Vonage. The Vonage company is a global cloud communication leader providing Apps and APIs (such as AI, Video, Voice, SMS, UC, and more) and is a prominent supplier of embedded video for hundreds of global Telehealth innovators. Vonage also assists businesses in stimulating their digital transformation.
The webinar focused on presenting changes in patient expectations regarding preferences for using new technology in medical communications and exploring the new role that communication through artificial intelligence can play in the entire healthcare process, such as utilizing channels that enable meeting patients where they currently are. It is worth noting that the COVID-19 pandemic has significantly influenced changes in patient preferences regarding the use of artificial intelligence, prompting both healthcare providers and patients to improve remote communication.
Currently there is a lot of pressure placed on healthcare organizations from different sources. For example: patient expectations, global economy, staffing challenges, healthcare digital transformation, and new disruptions. All these factors force on health organizations to change their practice. From the perspective of the webinar’s theme, patient expectations took center stage. According to the presented information the majority of patients positively assess the use of developed artificial intelligence (AI) tools to improve their experience (26% very positively, 35% somewhat positively, 28% neutrally and just only 8% somewhat negatively and 3% very negatively) yet an important fact is that consumers mostly want access to live consumer service when they require it as well consumers want to have communication options, callbacks, and round-the-clock customer support.
Before healthcare organizations decide to implement AI, it is important to consider three main points: data privacy, accuracy, and ethics. Data privacy pertains to questions like “where is your data directed?”, “what will be shared?”, and “what about legal issues?”. The second point, accuracy, is about maintaining AI focus and ensuring patients receive precise information. Lastly, ethics involves answering questions like “where is AI used?”. Moreover, organizations should ensure they have appropriate skills and focus on the gradual integration of artificial intelligence in patient relations.
Key issue addressed during the webinar was patient healthcare journeys. This journey takes place through various communication channels that are interconnected. Typically it consists of three stages: Conversational AI (downloading and creating app accounts and scheduling appointments), AI optimization (medical appointments), AI monitoring (remote patient monitoring/remote nurse care).
AI presents abundant opportunities across the patient journey. For instance, voice-enabled conversational AI can facilitate tasks such as providing information, scheduling appointments, and serving as a contact centers. Likewise, text-based conversational AI serves similar purposes, including information dissemination, appointment scheduling, and engaging in messaging conversations. Furthermore, AI can streamline processes and enhance interactions with patients by analyzing data, leveraging prior patient data sharing, and transcription information. Healthcare organizations can also utilize AI-powered video bots for health education for their patients. Key to the proper functioning of an AI system in patient conversations is the integration between individual channels, real-time data utilization, access to experts, and adaptation of systems to patient conditions.
According to the information presented, there is a possibility of using AI for patient counseling, particularly for those who cannot afford treatment, through the use of a virtual agent. There is also the potential to utilize AI to optimize the selection of a specialist for a particular case, as well as to create a system that enables the integration of AI with a customer’s voice bot to check their satisfaction without the need for live agents.
To meet customer expectations, it is important to observe current trends. Patients are increasingly using virtual education for their development in this segment. AI can be utilized, among other things, to generate knowledge base for the automatic delivery of information during conversations. After the pandemic period, there has been a growing focus on digital access to patient data, where AI could be helpful in creating a virtual database in a high-capacity cloud. Moreover engaging technology to observe and monitor patients, for example through a virtual nurse, will benefit from collecting and updating patient data.
The workshop also explored the new role Conversational AI can play throughout the healthcare journey, due to which the participants could learn how today’s no-code intelligent automation tools power patient conversations across speech, messaging, and other channels. The focus was also to discover how a frictionless, omnichannel approach to patient engagement delivers better outcomes by meeting patients where they are across channels, devices, and locations, which is especially of utmost importance in cross border innovative life science spheres.
