Can Chatbots Replace Human Therapists?
Chatbots are capable of understanding human impulses in a chat but they can not provide adequate care and advice as a human therapist.
Tech in healthcare or Health Tech investment has been surging after the COVID-19 pandemic. Medical institutions are incorporating advanced technologies, including autonomous monitoring systems, patient health ledgers, and online care, into their workflow. Behind these functionalities lies blockchain or Artificial Intelligence, making these delicate tasks faster than ever.
Chatbots are a technology that has existed for decades, answering predefined queries for patients. However, they were not that popular because the custom short answers they provided were far from satisfactory. The emergence of AI, integrating chatbots with intelligence, has mainstreamed chatbots in recent years. Reports suggest people find answers to their queries after chatting with a health bot.
With such results in day-to-day healthcare programs, experts explore the extent of AI in further advanced healthcare fields. AI in therapy is one such field where AI has shown results exceeding expectations with its practical use cases.
The elephant in the room is, will chatbots replace human therapists? In this blog, let us take a deep dive into the latest advancements in AI and mental health care and try to analyze the recent AI therapy bots to answer these questions.
What are Chatbots?
Chatbots are designed to ask a predefined flow of questions, providing users with initial responses to basic queries before consulting a professional. These chatbots are widely used in industries such as software, banking, healthcare, and more.
Recently, chatbots have become more capable and can answer questions with greater depth. AI-powered chatbots are used across the web, from real estate to finance and from e-commerce to healthcare websites.
Generative AI enables semantic learning in chatbots to interpret human emotions, meanings, and intentions in words, phrases, sentences, or larger units of text. Researchers are continuously working on improving the capabilities of these machine-learning models to deliver professional, human-like responses.
Can Chatbots Replace Human Therapists?
Chatbots aren’t programmed to give medical advice due to the large, varying data they are trained on. This can produce inaccuracies, which are intolerable in cases of human therapy. Even if AI is trained on specific medical data, it will still fall short of replacing human therapy. A patient’s gestures, relationships, and history with a human therapist play a vital role in the process, which chatbots are unable to provide.
Research from institutions such as MIT and Arizona State University has shown that AI is effective in therapy (to some extent) if a patient believes in it. Conducting their research on a group of hundreds, they found that AI can have various advantageous uses in therapy.
If Human Therapists Are Better, Why Use Chatbots?
AI chatbots offer the advantage of 24/7 availability at competitive costs, which machinery has over humans. Therapists, with their demanding schedules, spend significant time gathering and checklisting patient data. Often, they are unable to attend to all their patients in a day, highlighting a gap that AI can fill by assisting as primary care aides. Utilizing AI chatbots can streamline the care delivery process, reducing time and increasing efficiency.
For instance, AI chatbots can gather patient metrics before a therapist’s consultation, providing valuable data to inform diagnosis and treatment decisions. In an interview with Bloomberg, Margaret Mitchell, Chief Ethics Scientist at Hugging Face, discussed AI’s potential in triaging, and helping direct individuals to the appropriate resources quickly, especially in crisis situations where there is a shortage of experts. This automated assistance can significantly benefit overwhelmed crisis lines, such as those for veterans. Moreover, the concept of “rubber ducking,” or talking things out to another entity—even without a response—can be beneficial.
Just had a quite emotional, personal conversation w/ ChatGPT in voice mode, talking about stress, work-life balance. Interestingly I felt heard & warm. Never tried therapy before but this is probably it? Try it especially if you usually just use it as a productivity tool. https://t.co/9S97LPvBoS
— Lilian Weng (@lilianweng) September 26, 2023
Similarly, Lilian Weng, a researcher at OpenAI, tweeted about her emotional and personal conversation with ChatGPT in voice mode, noting how it provided a sense of being heard and warmth, likening it to a therapeutic experience.
Where Do Chatbots Fit in Human Therapy?
AI chatbots excel at understanding and collecting patients’ vital symptoms but fall short in providing treatment comparable to human therapists. For those seeking mental health support, connect with verified therapists via dedicated platforms.
While AI therapy can aid in primary care by gathering patient data and monitoring vital signs, it should complement, not replace, human therapists. Effective healthcare requires the collaboration of AI and human professionals. AI’s role extends beyond mental health, enhancing healthcare through tools like telemedicine, telehealth, and patient engagement software, thereby improving connectivity and primary care delivery.
Read more – How the Public Health Sector is Making Advances by Using AI in Healthcare
Share it on Twitter
Chatbots can now conduct therapy sessions! Experts say AI therapy helps people feel heard and gather themselves. While it can’t replace the human touch, AI can support mental health, connect with therapists, and reach more people.
What do you think?#AITherapy #mentalhealth pic.twitter.com/GlOWuh5KZx
— HCode Tech (@HcodeTech) July 24, 2024