Publications and research
Collaborative research
- How accurate are digital symptom assessment apps for suggesting conditions and urgency advice?: A clinical vignettes comparison to GPs.
- The utility of symptom checkers relies on safety, coverage, and accuracy.
- Ada’s advice was safe in 97% of cases, with 99% condition coverage and 70% accuracy for top 3 suggestion fit compared to the competitor average of 38%.
BMJ Open 2020 - Patients’ utilization and perception of an artificial intelligence-based symptom assessment and advice technology in a British primary care waiting room: Exploratory pilot study.
- 97.8% of patients rated Ada very or quite easy to use, and 12.8% would have delayed their appointment or used lower-intensity care.
JMIR Hum Factors 2020 - Syndromic surveillance insights from a symptom assessment app before and during COVID-19 measures in Germany and the United Kingdom: Results from repeated cross-sectional analyses.
- A review of data from 950,000 users found that Ada could help uncover the impact of public health policies like COVID-19 lockdown measures.
JMIR mHealth uHealth 2020 - Can a decision support system accelerate rare disease diagnosis? Evaluating the potential impact of Ada DX in a retrospective study.
- 89.25% of Ada’s top suggestions matched the confirmed diagnosis, and 33.3% of participants could have received their rare disease diagnosis in the first documented clinical visit with Ada.
Orphanet J Rare Dis 2019 - Improving emergency department patient-doctor conversation through an artificial intelligence symptom taking tool: an action-oriented design. pilot study.
- Ada supported conversation and improved rapport for 90% of patients, 73% of physicians, and 100% of nurses.
Pending publication - Optimization of Patient Flow in Urgent Care Centers Using a Digital Tool for Recording Patient Symptoms and History: Simulation Study
- Ada could decrease the average triage nurse waiting times by 54%.
JMIR Form Res 2021 - Prospective feasibility study of a novel Diagnostic Decision Support System (DDSS) for medical professionals.
- Ada’s DDSS prototype could support doctors’ decision-making by showing them new pathways and potential diagnoses.
- Ada provided accurate decision support in the clinical inpatient setting for people presenting with dyspnea.
Pending publication - Novel methods in the surveillance of influenza-like illness (ILI): exploration of data from the symptom assessment app Ada, Germany observational case study.
- Ada uncovered similar ILI trends to an official German surveillance system and could help identify health trends in countries without population-based monitoring systems.
JMIR Preprints 2021 - The quality of condition suggestions and urgency advice provided by the Ada symptom assessment app assessed with independently generated vignettes optimized for Australia.
- Ada identified the correct condition in the top 3 suggestions in 83% of cases, compared to the next best of 77%, including Australia-specific scenarios.
- 63% of Ada’s urgency advice matched the gold standard, compared to the next highest app’s score of 52%
Pending publication - Just how rare are rare diseases on Ada, a medical symptom checker?
- Ada suggested rare diseases in 4% of 15 million assessments, in line with the population rates.
Presented at the RE(ACT) Congress - IRDiRC Conference, Berlin, 2020 - The Potential of Digital Symptom-based Screening to Reduce the Transmission of SARS-CoV-2: a Modelling Study
- Digital symptom-based screening tools can substantially reduce the transmission of COVID-19.
- Applications like Ada (combined with testing and self isolation) could prevent an additional 8% of the population being infected.
Pending publication
Independent research
- Use Characteristics and Triage Acuity of a Digital Symptom Checker in a Large Integrated Health System: Population-Based Descriptive Study
- 46.4% of 26,646 Ada symptom assessments were completed outside GP office hours.
- Ada’s recommendations were comparable to triage nurses’.
J Med Internet Res 2020 - Accuracy of online symptom checkers and the potential impact on service utilisation.
- Ada had 73% accuracy compared to a 38% all-app average and 97% disposition safety compared to an 83% all-app average.
Pending publication - Accuracy of a chatbot (Ada) in the diagnosis of mental disorders: Comparative case study with lay and expert users.
- Ada could help identify mental health disorders in adults.
JMIR Form Res 2019 - From symptom to diagnosis-symptom checkers re-evaluated : Are symptom checkers finally sufficient and accurate to use? An update from the ENT perspective.
- Ada was the second-best app out of 24 tested in the ear, nose, and throat discipline.
HNO 2019 - What happened when Pulse tested symptom checker apps.
Ada was the most accurate of the 4 apps tested and was fast and easy to use.
Pulse Today 2019 - Can you really trust the medical apps on your phone?
- Ada was ‘by far the best’ app out of the 4 tested, asking clear questions and providing the best condition suggestions.
Wired UK 2017
Other publications
- Rare diseases 2030: How augmented AI will support diagnosis and treatment of rare diseases in the future.
- Ada could help detect genetic autoinflammatory disorders, including familial Mediterranean fever.
Ann Rheum Dis 2020