How AI can improve communication with patients

Photo:Michael Dziedzic

The efficiency of the doctor-patient relationship relies greatly on the efficiency of their communication. However, the ever-increasing number of patients due to the pandemic as well as poor communication skills by a great number of physicians have pushed health care providers to look for ways of increasing the communication efficiency between the patients. The use of artificial intelligence (AI) to function as a physician or improve patient/provider communication is one way of establishing a more satisfied patient relationship. Let's take a closer look at the benefits and improvements that come with the usage of AI in health care communication.

The importance of clean and timely communication with the patients

Before we go into further detail about the benefits of AI in communication with patients, let's also briefly mention the importance of proper communication. Timely communication with the patients is necessary to establish the right diagnosis, set an appointment, check-up, or follow-up, and contact the patient for further analysis. Clean or rather, clear communication is also a must. This is because the patient needs to have absolute trust and proper communication with the doctor. When a patient communicates with the doctor properly, a good trust and bond can be established. However, these are some of the things that often do not happen due to numerous different reasons in real-life communication. The results are often poorly established trust, missed appointments and controls, and overall miscommunication. So, how exactly can AI solve some of these issues and what are its benefits in health care?

More efficient and effective means of communication

We have already talked a lot about the importance of communication in health care and the overall relationship between the patient and the doctor. However, when it comes to AI, this is where things can improve greatly in terms of effective communication. With the constant development of technology, AI is also improving. Implementing AI in a health care system is something relatively new but already well-established.

The usage of AI in patient communication is efficient due to the incredible capacity of AI technology to constantly learn and develop. A proprietary natural language processing engine, that is fully built and functional to deal with and manage health interactions has the ability to increase the efficiency of the communication with the patients. Furthermore, this kind of processing engine can be formed and trained through millions of cases which then, in turn, allow it to achieve an incredible level of certainty in its work. In addition to this, AI has the ability to constantly learn, which we have already mentioned. This also means that it can expand on the languages with which it operates over time.

Using AI is cost-effective

The usage of AI is truly cost-effective and can save health care providers a ton of money. AI functions 24/7 and in this time period, it is constantly operational and constantly analyzing and learning. A human-run call center cannot achieve this. Moreover, AI can cover a ton of patients at the same time and constantly engage in new calls while simultaneously scheduling with other patients already on the line.

Setting up a call center, teaching the proper communication skills, establishing the necessary tools to engage in communication with the patients all costs money. As you can already tell, AI can do all of this in a simpler, but efficient way that is also cost-effective. Of course, in addition to this, a call center may not have the ability to work 24/7, unlike an AI. This improves communication with the patients as AI is constantly able to work with more and more patients while a call center for example cannot achieve this.

The percentage of mistakes is far lower

Mistakes in health care can be devastating. They can truly ruin a patient's health care journey and tarnish the relationship that the patient has with a health care provider. However, AI can greatly fix this. When using well-established AI, the chance and percentage of mistakes are far lower than when using a call center. This means that once AI integrates the mistakes that have been previously made, it cannot repeat them again. In turn, it enables seamless and flawless communication with the patients which is always clear and accurate.

Tone and style in the interactions

Each patient is different. Aside from having different kinds of needs and expectations from health care providers, every patient requires a slightly different approach in terms of communication. Call centers that are operated and run by humans often cannot achieve this kind of level of communication. However, AI on the other hand can. How does this all work exactly?

AI can help improve communication with the patients by programming itself to communicate differently depending on the patient. It can use different terms, and styles of communication as well as the overall tone. The way it builds on the communication is by constantly going through analyzing phases internally where it processes each patient communication and figures out the best possible approach for the given patient. The tone and style of communication are important and can help build better relationships with the patients which call centers, for example, would not be able to achieve properly.

The main takeaway

In summary, let us quickly take a look at the ways AI improves communication with patients. First of all, using AI in health care enables seamless and effective, 24/7 communication which cannot be achieved otherwise. Secondly, AI is constantly learning and developing which means that it gets better and better with each interaction. Thirdly, AI has a far lower mistake percentage which is crucial in health care and for the patient's journey. The tone and style can also be set and changed by the AI depending on the patient with whom it communicates. Overall, the benefits of using AI for communication with patients in health care are many. As health care providers are constantly looking for new, innovative solutions, AI is slowly becoming not just the thing of the future but the thing of the present as well.