A conversational agent to support remote care for individuals with substance use disorder

Music City Center 

Drug overdose deaths resulting from substance use disorder (SUD) have been on the rise. For patients experiencing SUD, long-term and multi-disciplinary care is vital as this population is at high risk of recurrence. With the increasing incidence of SUD, clinical care teams are at risk of burnout. Use of a chatbot is proposed to alleviate pressure to the healthcare system, as it has the potential to be scalable and cost-effective. This study is the product of a collaboration between Dimagi, a corporation developing this chatbot, UCLA, the academic partner providing research support and chatbot evaluation, and Massachusetts General Hospital, the clinical partner who will deploy this chatbot with their patients. Four beta-testers were used to examine feasibility of implementation, and we will be comparing substance use at baseline vs. at the end of the study for 55 patients who will be utilizing this chatbot. For this presentation, I will discuss the pros and cons of using a chatbot and how we design a study to train and evaluate large language models where special care must be taken when tuning the chatbot's sensitivity to matters that should be escalated to a health professional, as stakes can be much higher in a healthcare setting as compared to chatbots in service delivery sectors.