Conversational AI and Virtual Assistants for Neurological Patient Support

This chapter provides an analysis of the status quo, future trends, clinical use and opportunities of conversational artificial intelligence (AI) and virtual assistants in neurological care. Conversational AI systems are effective because of three areas that are connected to each other: natural language processing, dialogue management and collaboration with healthcare infrastructure. The use of cognitive rehabilitation, emotional support and better communication between patients and healthcare providers is not limited to their daily use in managing various symptoms. Patients with long-term neurological conditions have a chronic adherence dilemma with medication. Brain–computer interface technology is used to supplement conversational AI when it allows brain-to-computer communication. Federated learning allows the models to be trained at distributed devices without centralizing the sensitive data at a single point. Emotion recognition and response will also be one of the central aspects of next-generation AI.