A Hybrid Chatbot to Promote Pneumococcal Vaccination Among Older Adults

Can a hybrid chatbot combining a rule-based component delivering co-designed tailored interventions and an artificial intelligence component providing natural language processing–supported real-time answers to participants’ questions increase pneumococcal vaccination (PV) uptake among older adults?In this randomized clinical trial of 374 Hong Kong residents 65 years of age or older, those receiving the hybrid chatbot intervention at months 0, 1, 2, and 3 had significantly higher PV uptake than those receiving a chatbot-delivered standard online intervention without real-time answers to questions.Findings from this trial indicated that a hybrid chatbot may serve as a sustainable strategy to promote PV uptake among older adults.

Corresponding Author: Zixin Wang, PhD, School of Public Health, Prince of Wales Hospital, Room 508, Shatin, N.T., Hong Kong SAR, China (wangzx@cuhk.edu.hk).

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