Impressive for a Robot: In-Home Care Chatbots Included in Artificial Intelligence Solutions Adopted by Australia's Health System

A senior citizen grew accustomed to getting the AI's regular check-in at 10am.

A routine morning call by an automated voice assistant was not part of the service the participant expected when she signed up for the home care however when she was invited to participate in the pilot program four months ago, the 79-year-old said yes because she wanted to help. Even though, to be honest, her hopes were low.

Nevertheless, when she got the call, she says: “I was amazed by how interactive the AI was. It was impressive for a robot.”

“The system would inquire ‘how are you feeling today?’ and that provides a chance if you feel unwell to say you felt sick, or I just say ‘I’m fine, thank you’.”

“She would go on to ask follow-up questions – ‘did you manage to go outdoors today?’”

Aida would also inquire about what Rolls was planning for the day and “she would respond to that properly.”

“If I would say I’m going shopping, it would ask nice shopping or food shopping? I found it entertaining.”

Bots Easing the Workload on Healthcare Staff

The trial, which has recently concluded its first phase, is an example in which advances in artificial intelligence are being taken up in the medical field.

Health tech firm Healthily partnered with the care organization regarding the trial to utilize its generative AI technology to provide companionship, along with an option for home care clients to report any medical concerns or issues for a staff member to follow up.

Dean Jones, head of the home care division, explains the AI check-in under evaluation is not a substitute for any face to face interactions.

“Recipients continue to get a regular personal visit, but in between visits … the [AI] system enables a routine call, which can then flag any potential concerns to care staff or a client’s family,” Jones says.

Dr Tina Campbell, the CEO of Healthily, reports there haven’t been any adverse incidents noted from the pilot program.

The company uses advanced AI “with very clear guardrails and prompts” to guarantee the conversation is secure and mechanisms are in place to address serious health issues promptly, Campbell says. As an instance, if a patient is experiencing heart symptoms, it would be flagged to the medical staff and the conversation terminated so the person could dial triple zero.

She thinks AI has an significant part given significant workforce challenges throughout the healthcare sector.

“The benefit very safely, with technology like this, is lessen the administrative load on the staff so trained clinicians can focus on performing the duties that they specialize in,” she comments.

AI Not as New as Often Believed

Prof Enrico Coiera, the co-founder of the Australian Alliance for Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare, explains established types of AI have been a standard part of healthcare for a long time, often in “administrative functions” such as analyzing medical images, ECGs and lab reports.

“Any computer program that carries out a function that involves decision making in some way is artificial intelligence, regardless of how it achieves that,” states Coiera, who is also the director of the health informatics center at Macquarie University.

“When visiting the imaging department, radiology department or pathology lab, you’ll see software in machines performing these tasks.”

Over the past decade, advanced versions of artificial intelligence known as “deep learning” – an algorithmic approach that allows algorithms to analyze very large sets of data – have been used to read medical imaging and enhance detection, the expert notes.

Recently, BreastScreen NSW became the nation's first population-based screening program to adopt AI analysis tools to support specialists in interpreting a specific set of mammography images.

These represent specialized tools that still require a specialist doctor to evaluate the findings they might suggest, and the responsibility for a medical decision sits with the medical practitioner, the professor emphasizes.

AI’s Role in Identifying Illness Early

The Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne has been working alongside researchers from a UK university who first developed artificial intelligence techniques to detect epilepsy brain abnormalities known as focal cortical dysplasias from brain scans.

These abnormalities cause seizures that often are resistant with medication, so surgical intervention to excise the tissue becomes the sole option. But, the surgery can proceed if the surgeons can pinpoint the abnormal tissue.

A study published this week in the journal Epilepsia, a group from the institute, led by specialist Emma Macdonald-Laurs, showed their “neural network tool” could detect the abnormalities in nearly all of cases from advanced imaging in a subtype of the lesions that have historically been overlooked in more than half of patients (60%).

The AI was trained on the images of 54 patients and then evaluated with pediatric cases and 12 adults. Among the youngsters, twelve underwent operations and 11 are now seizure free.

This technology uses neural network classifiers comparable with the mammography analysis – highlighting regions of abnormality, which are subsequently reviewed by experts “speeding up the process to reach a conclusion,” Macdonald-Laurs says.

She emphasises the researchers are currently in initial stages of the project, with a additional research required to advance the tool toward clinical implementation.

Prof Mark Cook, a neurologist who was independent from the research, says MRI scans now produce such vast quantities of high-resolution data that it is challenging for a person to go through it accurately. So for doctors the challenge of finding these abnormalities was like “searching for a needle in a haystack.”

“This illustrates of how artificial intelligence can assist clinicians in making earlier, precise identifications, and has the ability to improve surgical access and outcomes for children with otherwise intractable epilepsy,” the professor says.

Disease Detection in the Future

Dr Stefan Buttigieg, the deputy head of the European Public Health Association’s AI health division, explains advanced AI systems are additionally used to track and forecast disease outbreaks.

Buttigieg, who spoke recently at the Public Health of Australia’s conference in the city, cited a tech firm, a company established by medical experts and which was an early detector to identify the coronavirus pandemic.

Generative AI is a additional branch of machine learning, in which the system can produce original material based on training data. These uses in healthcare include programs such as Healthily’s AI voice bot along with the AI scribes doctors and allied health professionals are increasingly using.

A GP representative, the president of the Royal Australian College of GPs, reports family doctors have been embracing digital assistants, which captures the appointment and converts it to a consultation note that can be included in the health file.

The president states the main benefit of the scribes is that it enhances the quality of the interaction between the physician and individual.

Dr Danielle McMullen, the chair of the national doctors' group, agrees that AI note-takers are helping physicians manage schedules and says artificial intelligence can also help to prevent duplication of tests and scans for their patients, if the {promised digitisation|planned digitalization