Self-Diagnosis through AI-enabled Chatbot-based Symptom Checkers: User Experiences and Design Considerations - Yue You; Xinning Gui (advisor) ...

Self-Diagnosis through AI-enabled Chatbot-based
Symptom Checkers: User Experiences and Design
Considerations

Yue You; Xinning Gui (advisor)
College of Information sciences and technology

ROADMAP

 Feature analysis
 for 11 selected    App review        Interview
 CSC (Chatbot-      analysis for 4    study for
 based Symptom      selected CSC      CSC apps
 Checkers) apps     apps

                        Findings
                       Implications

                                                  2

CHATBOT-BASED SYMPTOM CHECKER (CSC) APPS HAVE
SPRUNG UP IN THE HEALTHCARE MARKET….

                  Downloads > 1,000,000   Inaccurate diagnoses
                  Google Play

                                                            3

APP FEATURE ANALYSIS

8 stages of an offline diagnostic process

     1          2          3         4          5           6             7          8

 Establish   Conduct    Evaluate   Give an     Order     Perform &      Provide a   Referrals or
 a patient   physical   symptoms   initial     further   analyze        final       other follow-
 history     exams                 diagnosis   tests     test results   diagnosis   up treatments

                                                                                               4

APP REVIEW ANALYSIS

      •   We screened reviews on the basis of the following two criteria:
           (1) The review is in English;
           (2) The review is no shorter than 20 characters.
      •   We selected 500 most-recent reviews for each app

                                                                            5

INTERVIEW STUDY
       •   Our participants aged from 23 to 40.
       •   These interviews took about 30 minutes to 1 hour:
             (1) Which app do you prefer (if the user has used more than one)?
             (2) How do you feel about having conversations with these apps?
             (3) What are your preferred forms of conversation?
                       Ten semi-structured interviews

                Step1                  Step2                    Step3
             Screen survey                               Thematic analysis in
                                                          inductive approach
The eligibility criteria for users were as follows:
(1) Over the age of 18;
(2) Had used CSC app(s) to seek possible diagnoses;
(3) The last time of use was within the last year.

                                                                                 6

FINDINGS - APP REVIEW ANALYSIS AND INTERVIEW

A failure to consider         Rigid input               Problematic probing
patient history               requirements              questions

Ignore existing diagnoses   Limited descriptions for   The difficulty of
and medications             disease dimensions         comprehending complex
                                                       sentences

Overlook personal           Limited presentations of   Slow interactions with
information                 symptoms input             numerous/seemly irrelevant
                                                       questions

                                                                            7

FINDINGS - APP REVIEW ANALYSIS AND INTERVIEW

  A neglect of diverse health      A lack of enough functions
  conditions and user groups       for follow-up treatments

                                   Need to support customized
  Lack support for diverse
                                   symptoms tracking
  diseases

                                   Need to reach out medical
  Lack support for certain         professionals
  user groups
                                   Need to provide information
                                   regarding medications

                                                                 8

TAKE AWAY

•   CSC apps should provide similar     •        The future conversational        Implications for clinical
    functions and experiences to clinical        design of healthcare             practice:
    visits in the real world:                    chatbots:                        •   Health providers may guide
      •    Consider users’ offline experiences     •   Consider how to improve        users by introducing the
      •    Enhance the technology’s                    the input flexibility          credibility as well as the
           knowledge base                          •   Improve the presentation       limitations of these apps to
                                                       of probing questions.          assist users to make more
      •    Follow the guidelines of inclusive                                         reliable decisions.
           design to accommodate diverse
           contexts

                                                                                                                9

Thank you!
Email me at: yxy340@psu.edu