Baidu launches medical assistant chatbot to help doctors collect patient information

Chinese search engine company Baidu is announcing today the release of Melody, a chatbot powered by artificial intelligence (A.I.) that lives inside the existing Baidu Doctor app for Android and iOS. This app collects medical information from people and then passes it to doctors in a form that makes it easier to use for diagnostic purposes or to otherwise respond to. For now, the chatbot only communicates in and understands Chinese and is only available to patients and doctors in China. The app that Melody is placed in lets users ask medical questions and make appointments to meet with their doctors. Melody goes one step further; it reduces the amount of time patients and doctors have to spend exchanging basic information.