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A Conversational Agent for Promoting Physical Activity Among COPD Patients

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Information Systems and Technologies (WorldCIST 2022)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems ((LNNS,volume 468))

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  • The original version of this chapter was revised: The author name “Marcelo Brites” has been changed to “Marcelo Brites-Pereira”. The correction to this chapter is available at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04826-5_70

Abstract

Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is one of the most prevalent diseases in the world, affecting respiratory performance of many people, limiting the airflow and is not fully reversible. It is a clinical syndrome characterized by chronic respiratory symptoms, structural pulmonary abnormalities or impairment of lung function. In order to help people with this disease, we propose an innovative personalized mHealth coaching platform that will address patient preferences and contextual factors – the OnTRACK platform. This platform is composed of a mobile application for patients, a web platform for healthcare professionals – and a conversational agent (or chatbot), named “Hígia”, which acts as an alternative interface between patients and the platform.

This conversational agent includes several of the main functionalities already available in OnTRACK’s smartphone app, complementing and extending it. It allows consulting prescription information in a multitude of ways, getting and setting all personal data, inserting physical activity measurements, and obtaining historical data on physical activity and prescriptions, among others. The evaluation of the conversational agent yielded encouraging results, with users reporting being happier, more motivated, dedicated and confident when interacting with the systems using their voice, while allowing the development team to identify topics for improvement.

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Change history

  • 21 December 2022

    In the original version of the book, the following belated corrections have been incorporated: The author name “Marcelo Brites” has been changed to “Marcelo Brites-Pereira” in the Frontmatter, Backmatter and in Chapter 49. The book has been updated with the changes.

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Acknowledgments

This work was funded by FEDER through COMPETE2020—Programa Operacional Competitividade e Internacionalização (POCI) and by national funds (OE) through Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia ("OnTRACK – On Time to Rethink Activity Knowledge: a personalized mHealth coaching platform to tackle physical inactivity in COPD”, POCI-01-0145-FEDER-028446).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Technology and Management, Computer Science and Communications Research Centre, Polytechnic of Leiria, Leiria, Portugal

    Ricardo Rodrigues, Ruben Caceiro, Fernando Silva & José Ribeiro

  2. Center for Innovative Care and Health Technology (ciTechCare), Polytechnic of Leiria, Leiria, Portugal

    Ruben Caceiro, Marcelo Brites-Pereira, Sofia Flora & Joana Cruz

  3. School of Health Sciences, Polytechnic of Leiria, Leiria, Portugal

    Sofia Flora & Joana Cruz

Authors
  1. Ricardo Rodrigues
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  2. Ruben Caceiro
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  3. Marcelo Brites-Pereira
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  4. Sofia Flora
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  5. Joana Cruz
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  6. Fernando Silva
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  7. José Ribeiro
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to José Ribeiro .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. ISEG, Universidade de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal

    Alvaro Rocha

  2. College of Engineering, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA

    Hojjat Adeli

  3. Institute of Data Science and Digital Technologies, Vilnius University, Vilnius, Lithuania

    Gintautas Dzemyda

  4. DCT, Universidade Portucalense, Porto, Portugal

    Fernando Moreira

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Rodrigues, R. et al. (2022). A Conversational Agent for Promoting Physical Activity Among COPD Patients. In: Rocha, A., Adeli, H., Dzemyda, G., Moreira, F. (eds) Information Systems and Technologies. WorldCIST 2022. Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems, vol 468. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04826-5_49

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