Chatbots in Health Care: Connecting Patients to Information

Why Is This an Issue? Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly being used in health care settings. Chatbots geared toward patient use are becoming more widely available, but the clinical evidence of their effectiveness remains limited. What Is the Technology? AI-based chatbots are computer programs or software applications that have been designed to engage in simulated conversation with humans using humanlike language. Chatbots can help humans save time and allow them to focus on more high-level creative or strategic thinking by taking over more routine or repetitive tasks, such as automated customer service chats, appointments, or staff scheduling. What Is the Potential Impact? Anyone with access to an internet-enabled computer or a smartphone could use these chatbots to access health information. Chatbots can provide patients with 24/7 access to health information, such as symptom assessment, supportive information, medication reminders, or appointment scheduling, allowing access to information when health care providers are unavailable. There appear to be trends toward efficacy and user satisfaction, but the evidence to support the clinical effectiveness of chatbots in health care is still being established. Existing health care chatbots are mostly free for patients to access, although some developers and health care providers charge fees to access additional features or content. Some apps may be prescribed to patients by providers. These could be covered by insurance or licensed to health care providers by the developer. What Else Do We Need to Know? Ethical and data privacy issues remain top of mind when considering the widespread implementation of chatbots for patient use in health care settings. ChatGPT and other AI tools that were not developed specifically for health care do not necessarily provide the level of data privacy that is required of health care information. They are also trained on historical datasets and do not provide responses based on the most current clinical recommendations or health data. The development of AI-specific ethical frameworks could facilitate safer and more consistent development of AI tools in health care by preventing the misuse of AI technologies and minimizing the spread of misinformation. AI tools still require human oversight in terms of moderation and troubleshooting.