The practical development and deployment of bots has accelerated in the last year within healthcare. bots are playing a role in the improvement of consumer-member-patient interactions with providers as well as health plans by enhancing customer service support, supporting wellness programs for patients with chronic conditions, and an array of other applications. Additionally, bots make it extremely easy and cost effective to interact with providers, health plans, and care teams.
In customer service, customer-patient interactions improve with the use of:
- Scheduling assistant bots that help patients set appointments with the right doctor, provide appointment reminders, and post appointment actions reminders.
- Website navigator bots that are being leveraged to help patients-consumers easily find the right department within a comprehensive website.
- Conversational bots are supporting providers to check-up, remind, and encourage patents to take their medication – increasing adherence and improving outcomes.
With the use of artificial intelligence, chatbots in particular are supporting providers, care teams, and health plans in the ongoing coaching of patient populations.
- Coaching wellness programs where bots are able to track and provide guidance on nutrition, exercise, as well as encouraging consumers to make healthier choices.
- Managing chronic care such as diabetes by reminding patients to take insulin at regular intervals, sending automated alerts to care teams if there is a lack of medication adherence, recommending appropriate diet, and appointment reminders.
The use of bots will continue to grow and get smarter in the applications they can be used within to solve more problems. For the foreseeable future bots will continue playing a key role in improving patient experience and medical staff productivity, while driving down the cost of care.
What bots are you currently using and how have they improved the patient-consumer experience?
