Alexa Can Truly Give Patients a Voice in Their Health Care (Part 1 of 3)

This article explores the potential of new interfaces to transform the handling of chronic disease, and what the challenge reveals about currently available technology. Alexa, of course, is the ground-breaking system that brings everyday voice interaction with computers into the home. Most of its uses are trivial (you can ask about today’s weather or change channels on your TV), but one must not underestimate the immense power of combining artificial intelligence with speech, one of the most basic and essential human activities. The potential of this interface for disabled or disoriented people is particularly intriguing. The diabetes challenge is a nice focal point for exploring the more serious contribution made by voice interfaces and NLP. Because of the alarming global spread of this illness, the challenge also presents immediate opportunities that I hope the participants succeed in productizing and releasing into the field. Using the challenge’s published criteria, the judges today announced Sugarpod from Wellpepper as the winner. This article will list some common themes among the five finalists, look at the background about current EHR interfaces and NLP, and say a bit about the unique achievement of each finalist. Common themes Overlapping visions of goals, problems, and solutions appeared among the finalists I interviewed for the diabetes challenge: A voice interface allows more frequent and easier interactions with at-risk individuals who have chroni...
Source: EMR and HIPAA - Category: Information Technology Authors: Tags: Care Management System Digital Health Healthcare AI Healthcare Analytics Medication Adherence Personalized Medicine Artificial Intelligence Care Coordination Diabetes Management Natural Language Processing NLP Voice Interface Source Type: blogs