Computers can now help doctors in diagnosing diseases and assist in monitoring a patient’s vital signs from hundreds of miles away, thanks to improvements in artificial intelligence technology.
Now, CU Boulder researchers are eyeing integrating machine learning into psychiatry through a speech-based mobile app that could tell a patient’s mental health status as good as (and maybe better) what a human is capable of doing.
“We are not in any way trying to replace clinicians,” says Peter Foltz, a research professor at the Institute of Cognitive Science and co-author of a new paper in Schizophrenia Bulletin that lays out the promise and potential pitfalls of AI in psychiatry. “But we do believe we can create tools that will allow them to better monitor their patients.”
Nearly one in five U.S. adults lives with a mental illness, many in remote areas where access to psychiatrists or psychologists is scarce. Others can’t afford to see a clinician frequently, don’t have time or can’t get in to see one.
More details about this over at Neuroscience News.
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