The Kindness of Robots – Dr. Cory Kidd, Founder, CEO, Catalia Health – How Robots with Sophisticated AI Are Helping Patients Take Better Care of Themselves

Dr. Cory Kidd, founder and CEO of Catalia Health, delivers an informative discussion on chronic disease healthcare management and the benefits of using robots that are tailored to a particular patient’s needs to help them manage their conditions.

With over two decades of experience

in healthcare technology focused on innovations and solutions to major

healthcare challenges, Dr. Kidd is uniquely qualified to make an impact in the

patient/user experience. He has successfully launched other health and tech

oriented companies as a veteran of the industry. Dr. Kidd received a M.S. and

Ph.D. at the MIT Media Lab, specializing in human-robot interaction. His

primary objective while there was to demonstrate how there were obvious

clinical, as well as psychological, advantages to using physical robots instead

of traditional screen-based methods. While the front end allows for easy

patient interfacing, the back end flows to doctors and health professionals who

are working to monitor the overall progress of these chronic care patients. From

arthritis to kidney issues and more, Catalia Health’s robotic tech products

deliver outstanding results for patient and doctor.

As the health technology CEO explains, the

robot elicits a stronger long-term engagement with patients. The fact that the

robot actually looks at you creates a much deeper psychological connection with

patients, which drives them to be more involved with their own health and the

management of their condition over long periods of time. Catalia Health’s

robots (know individually as Mabu) are built on a set of artificial

intelligence algorithms that draw on psychology to form the conversations with

patients. As it is not scripted, but interaction based, the experience feels

interactive and real, and, ironically, more human. Much like a physician

tailors the needed medical information and delivers it in a way that is best

suited for an individual, Catalia Health’s robots also interact and respond

with patients in a manner that creates a comfortable experience. Catalia

Health’s platform‘s integrated technology learns about a patient’s overall

personality, and their interests, as well as any particular treatment

difficulties or challenges they have had over time. This enables the Mabu robot

to engage in conversations that are unique to each patient, based on

established behavioral models of psychology designed to promote significant

behavioral change for improved well-being. As Mabu communicates daily, patients

are much more likely to manage their treatment better. Dr. Kidd gives a detailed

analysis on the topics of symptoms, side effects, and psychosocial issues,

which are three major components of the AI based care management. And as the

old modified proverb says, the proof is in the pudding, and this is certainly

evidenced by Catalia Health’s data from their experimentation and market

testing. In multiple testing situations in which three groups of patients were

told to use either the paper log system to record and manage their care, the

Catalia Health software on a computer, or the system integrated into an actual

robot, the robot was strongly preferred, by far. Some people even tried to

negotiate to keep their test robot longer, which is about as glowing an

endorsement as you could hope for. The robots clearly have won.