Emirates Health Services unveils the Virtual Nurse project

Emirates Health Services (EHS) has introduced a range of new healthcare initiatives, including an AI-powered virtual nurse service.

The projects also encompass a generative AI system triage and appointment scheduling assistance, along with the incorporation of Metaverse technologies. Furthermore, the implementation of the "From Data to Actionable Insight using 3M Programme" project is underway.

Virtual nurse and generative AI-powered triage

The AI-powered virtual nurse represents a pioneering innovation in healthcare at Emirates Health Services. Designed to simulate the human nurse's interactions, it utilizes advanced AI and clinical algorithms. The technology serves as a database catalog, containing over 10,000 diagnoses and symptoms. It enables understanding and response to patient inquiries, offers medical advice, and assists in case assessment and triage. The virtual nurse can be accessed through various platforms such as the EHS' application, website, or interactive kiosks in healthcare facilities.

As for the generative AI-based symptom diagnosis system, it is an intelligent solution aimed at simplifying the patient journey and enhancing the productivity and efficiency of healthcare providers. The key features of this model include symptom analysis, assisting in appointment booking using generative AI capabilities to capture patient symptoms, verifying potential diagnoses, and suggesting appropriate specialties for appointment scheduling.

This project is one of the pioneering initiatives implemented exclusively by Emirates Health Services in the Middle East. It utilizes 3M's clinical risk groups and relies on clinical classification to categorize and group populations, aiming to measure variations in disease burdens across major categories. The goal is to visualize the variations in disease burdens for the population in the country — according to the scope of the Emirates Health Services — using population pyramids, tables, and heat maps.

The project will compare and exchange variations in disease burdens for major disease categories such as diabetes, stroke, cancer, obesity, and cardiovascular diseases, using different components of the clinical risk groups (ACRG, MDC, EDC, Health Status).

The context

The new initiatives were announced during Emirates Health Services' participation in Arab Health 2024, under the theme "Innovating for Your Health... Excelling with You." It encompasses four main pillars: "Healthy Community," "Pioneering Care," "Artificial Intelligence and Predictive Models," and "Sustainability." EHS is showcasing 27 pioneering healthcare projects in this year's edition, including 15 projects being presented for the first time regionally and globally on its platform.

Mubaraka Ibrahim, Acting Chief Information Officer of the Information Sector at Emirates Health Services, reiterated EHS' dedication to presenting its latest healthcare projects and AI-based programmes.