ABSTRACT
This paper reviews different types of conversational agents used in health care for chronic conditions, examining their underlying communication technology, evaluation measures, and AI methods. A systematic search was performed in February 2021 on PubMed Medline, EMBASE, PsycINFO, CINAHL, Web of Science, and ACM Digital Library. Studies were included if they focused on consumers, caregivers, or healthcare professionals in the prevention, treatment, or rehabilitation of chronic diseases, involved conversational agents, and tested the system with human users. The search retrieved 1087 articles. Twenty-six studies met the inclusion criteria. Out of 26 conversational agents (CAs), 16 were chatbots, seven were embodied conversational agents (ECA), one was a conversational agent in a robot, and another was a relational agent. One agent was not specified. Based on this review, the overall acceptance of CAs by users for the self-management of their chronic conditions is promising. Users' feedback shows helpfulness, satisfaction, and ease of use in more than half of included studies. Although many users in the studies appear to feel more comfortable with CAs, there is still a lack of reliable and comparable evidence to determine the efficacy of AI-enabled CAs for chronic health conditions due to the insufficient reporting of technical implementation details.
Subject(s)
Artificial Intelligence , Communication , Chronic Disease , Delivery of Health Care , Humans , Information TechnologyABSTRACT
There are major disparities in oral health between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and non-Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. The New South Wales (NSW) Aboriginal Oral Health Plan 2014-2020 was developed to improve the oral health of Aboriginal people. This scoping review describes programs that have been undertaken to implement the NSW Aboriginal Oral Health Plan 2014-2020. The methodology by Arksey and O'Malley was used to guide this review. Academic and grey literature were searched using a structured Medline, Lowitja and advanced Google searches. Articles were included if they aligned with the strategic directions of the Plan. Key information, including the aims of the study, methodology and results were recorded in a template on Microsoft Excel software. A total of 31 articles were included in this review. This included 25 articles from the academic literature and six initiatives from the grey literature. Included articles were categorised according to the six strategic directions in the NSW Aboriginal Oral Health Plan. Four studies were related to the first strategic direction, six related to strategic direction two, four related to strategic direction three, six initiatives related to strategic direction four, five related to strategic direction five, and eight related to strategic direction six. While there has been significant progress in achieving the strategic directions of the NSW Aboriginal Oral Health Plan, there is scope for continued collaboration between oral health service providers, universities and Aboriginal communities to improve oral health outcomes for Aboriginal people in NSW.