AI Chatbot Helps People With Asthma Navigate Health Insurance Open Enrollment

The Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America (AAFA) has released a new tool for the asthma community – an asthma health chatbot. The chatbot is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week to help people get answers to their questions about asthma or health insurance. This can be a valuable tool for people shopping for health insurance during the final 10 days left in the federal open enrollment period.

The prototype chatbot uses artificial intelligence and helps people learn more about managing and controlling asthma, asthma treatments and how to deal with asthma triggers. As the chatbot learns from its conversations, it will expand its knowledge base to deliver asthma information.

“AAFA is thrilled to offer this chatbot to our asthma community as part of our ongoing commitment to innovation and education,” stated Kenneth Mendez, AAFA’s CEO and president. “AAFA is a leader in digital technologies for patients and families. Our chatbot is our latest service to provide our community with vital asthma education.”

To access AAFA’s asthma health chatbot, visit aafa.org/chatbot and click a button in the chatbot to get started or type your comment in the “reply” box.

AAFA’s chatbot is rolling out to help people better understand health insurance and open enrollment. Open enrollment for 2020 through the federal health insurance marketplace ends on Dec. 15, 2019.

“Affordable access to asthma specialists and medications can be the difference between controlled and uncontrolled asthma,” said Dr. Alison A. Galbraith, M.D., MPH, of Harvard Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute. “Uncontrolled asthma can lead to missed work and school, emergency room visits and hospitalizations. We hope this chatbot will help people understand their health insurance options and how to find out if their health plan covers their asthma medicines and specialists.”

AAFA partnered with Harvard Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute to research the impact of high deductible health plans on asthma management and control. The goal of the AFFORD (Asthma in Families Facing Out-of-Pocket Requirements with Deductibles) study is to learn more about the role people’s health insurance plays in their asthma care. The study is funded by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI).