Interactive health information chatbot for non-communicable diseases in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
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Date
2019-10
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Kampala International University, School of Computing and Information Technology
Abstract
The rate of deaths as a result of NCDs continues to increase at an alarming rate across Africa due to a lack of proper awareness in understanding the non-communicable diseases and their impacts. Despite several health campaigns, efforts and methods that are being used to promote health literacy on NCDs to the public, the majority of patients get to know about NCDs when they happen to visit a hospital, and at that time it might already be too late for some of them. The purpose of this study aimed at increasing awareness of non-communicable diseases using an AI interactive Chatbot at Wazo ward Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The study adopted the Information Systems Success (ISS) Model as a theoretical framework to measure the success of user satisfaction on Chatbot technology as a customer support service in the form of a survey conducted online when testing the proposed Chatbot. The study was based on qualitative and quantitative research approaches to guarantee the dependability of the findings. The study comprised 100 participants sample size, whereby 95 participants were the general public from Wazo ward and 5 were the key informants (health providers). The study used interviews to collect data from the key informants and questionnaires to gather facts from the general public to obtain the information. Data were analyzed quantitatively with the help of Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) computer program to process and present data in the form of graphs and tables. The current health information dissemination methods from the surveys showed that majority (94%) of the community were aware non-communicable diseases but they respond fairly in taking preventive measures against the diseases because they are facing a number of challenges when searching for information about the diseases in Wazo ward including high internet costs provided by network providers, reliability, availability and feedback and language barrier. Findings indicated that most respondents (92.6 percent) rely solely on their mobile devices to access health information online and 97 per cent of the respondents used messaging apps for communication hence an autonomous Chatbot for non-communicable diseases was designed using an online tool Botsociety, developed in PHP language using the BotMan framework and Dialogflow for Natural Language Processing, tested and was integrated with Facebook Messenger platform as it offers free public API access to help increase awareness of non-communicable diseases for people at Wazo ward Kinondoni municipality, Dar es Salaam region in Tanzania. The Chatbot was tested for satisfaction, usability, responsiveness, efficiency, accuracy, reliability, maintainability and portability. The results of implementation were satisfactory.
Description
Master of Science in Software Engineering, Kampala International University
Keywords
Interactive Health information Chatbot, Non-communicable diseases, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania