Opinion: STAT+: Why we created a chatbot to help people at risk for eating disorders
The grim reality is there will never be enough trained therapists to meet the demand for eating disorder treatment.
In May, a National Public Radio story asked, “Can a chatbot help people with eating disorders as well as another human?”
It focused on a chatbot that we developed to prevent eating disorders and help people with body image concerns and who are otherwise not likely to have access to other resources. We’ve committed our careers to increasing detection of eating disorders and access to care, and we received research funding from the National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA) to create and evaluate a chatbot called Tessa in hopes of preventing eating disorders and helping to address the problem that once individuals develop eating disorders, less than 20% ever receive any care.
The NPR story and coverage that followed led to a tremendous backlash for a couple of reasons. Some of those reasons are fair and are related to a technical problem — more on that in a minute.
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