Mayo Clinic First Aid: A New Alexa Skill for Health Guidance

Lee EngferNovember 29, 2017

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Mayo Clinic Global Business Solutions

• Extends Mayo Clinic knowledge and capabilities through integrated health and wellness solutions

• Long history of trusted health information,50,000+ content assets

• New digital channels, artificial intelligence opportunities to expand content partnerships

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Project Goals• Investment in innovation

and speed

• Enter voice market early

• Learn to optimize contentfor new channel

• Inform future processes, roles, technology

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Connecting the Dot1. Start with existing content from mayoclinic.org2. Adapt content for voice using Orbita software platform3. Conduct user testing4. Get certified from Amazon5. Skill goes live

Amazon, Kindle, Echo, Alexa, Dash, Fire and all related logos are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates.

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TerminologySkill – Alexa voice “app”Topic (taxonomy) tree – a content hierarchyTopics/subtopics – subject nodes in a content hierarchy (e.g. Poison/Treatment)Orbita admin console – Web-based graphical user interface for editing content items and configuring Orbita VoiceSpeech synthesis – technology that converts text into speech (Alexa’s voice)Card – text from skill topic presented within the Alexa mobile app

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Utterance – what the user actually says

Intent – what the user means

Slot values/match phrases – the variable part of an utterance; may be expressed in many different ways

Source: Amazon Alexa Voice Design Guide, 2017

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1. Start with existing content• Why First Aid?

• Relatively small content set• Useful in this application

• XML files to Orbita

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Content in Orbitaconsole

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JSON

Graphical experience design tool

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2. Adapt content for voice

• Structuring content for natural language processing

• Topics/subtopics• Subtopics organized by

importance• Navigation strategy

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• Important information early in topic

• Orient user in first sentence• Some topics, subtopics

combined

• Length/style adaptations• Even more conversational• Focus on what’s essential• Style issues

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• End sentence with action

• Account for many possible utterances (match phrases)

• All content went through medical review

“What to do about a bee sting.”

“I was stung by a wasp.”“I got bitten by a scorpion.”

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Using voice editing tools

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3. Conduct user testing• Internal volunteers

• Amazon

• Fixing bugs

• Adjusting match phrasesand utterances

• Syntons and symtonsfor “symptoms”

• Confession for “concussion”

• Spring, spraint, strain for “sprain”

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4. Get certified by Amazon• Skill submitted July 21, certified August 4• Resubmissions based on feedback from Amazon

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5. Skill goes live• Timeline

• Spring 2017: Vendor proposals

• May-July: Build skill

• July-August: Testing

• August 21: Soft launch

• September 17: Public Affairs launch

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• Skill demo

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Lessons Learned• Added time for listening to content

• (There’s no) accounting for (all) utterances

• Need to guide user back to what they want to do

• Field is moving fast – best practices are evolving all the time

1) Variations on “Mayo First Aid”"ask me a 1st date how I treat a cut" "ask whale 1st date how to treat by babies fever""ask meal 1st date how to treat influenza""ask mail 1st date how to treat 3rd degree burns”

2) Questions we can’t answer"what is the treatment for a zombie bite""how to treat a CBS theme""how do you stop a cat from bleeding""how do I treat a sweaty bag"

3) What the …"what happens when what kind of spider bites do you have when you have spider bites 1 and a trail""went to see care for medical doll" "where is my nearest male urgent care facility"

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Future Horizons• Skill maintenance (analytics, user feedback)• Connect all content through single-source CMS• Model content to facilitate cross-channel (including

other voice agents) delivery

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Questions?

New technology, rather than eliminating older technology, increases choices. … The history of technology also shows that Luddites always lose.

- Mark Kurlansky, Paper: Paging Through History