Voice-based control system for smart hospital wards: a pilot study of patient acceptance - BMC Health Services Research

The increased demand for healthcare services, particularly in an aging society, has become a major challenge in developed countries. Previous studies have proposed that governments and healthcare providers such as hospitals and long-term care institutions should prepare a coping solution to ensure comprehensive care. Intuitively, increasing the amount of medical staff to guarantee that every demand could be satisfied is the most straightforward way. However, human resources are precious. Therefore, using information technology to reduce human resources and improve nursing efficiency has become a crucial issue.

Voice-based control, a specific IoT technology application used in healthcare environments, could improve healthcare quality and experience

Thus, in this study, a structural questionnaire adopting TAM was used to evaluate the patient acceptance of the voice-based control system implemented in the real clinical workflow of academic medical center wards. Finally, we discuss the advantages of using the VSC system and identify potential opportunities for the hospital when building similar systems.