About the project
People from ethnic minority groups are disproportionately affected by sexually transmitted infections (STIs)/HIV and experience challenges accessing sexual health services due to discrimination, stigma and a reluctance to address sensitive issues related to their sexuality. The Department of Health has identified reducing STI/HIV rates as a priority for improving sexual health and recognised ethnic minorities as being vulnerable to these infections.
Home-based and online STI/HIV screening services are increasingly used within the NHS, yet they fail to take into account the cultural distinctiveness of minority groups and the difficulties they face. This results in lower screening uptake and lower use of clinical interventions and therefore contributes to enduring health inequalities.
The AUDITED project stands for 'Assessing acceptability, utilisation and disclosure of health information to an automated chatbot for advice about sexually transmitted infections in minoritised ethnic populations'. In partnership with Positive East charity, this project has co-designed and piloted an automated chatbot, called Pat, to improve knowledge of STIs/HIV and promote online screening services. For the chatbot to make accurate recommendations, users need to disclose personal information about their sexual behaviours. The project now seeks to make the chatbot culturally appropriate, acceptable and easy to use for ethnic minorities.
The research programme has three work packages: community engagement, stakeholder consultation and a simulation study on an optimised and enhanced chatbot. It uses multiple research methods such as surveys, interviews and chatbot modelling. The project's aim is to develop an equitable health chatbot implementation roadmap that will guide chatbot developers around co-designing the technology to reduce health inequalities. It engages with a wide range of community organisations and relevant patient and public groups to advise us on every stage of our research and chatbot development. The AUDITED project is funded by NHS AI Lab and the Health Foundation, managed by the National Institute for Health and Care Research, in collaboration with the University of Southampton and the University of Sussex.
Investigators
Tom Nadarzynski
Deborah Husbands
Tom Buchanan
Damien Ridge