An Intelligent Framework for Usable Speech-Enabled E-Health System

Abstract

People search websites for health information for self-care, but the information provided by these e-health portals are delivered in text form and this does not cater for the needs of the visually impaired, the blind, the low-literate and those that are not computer literate. Also, existing speech-based disease screening initiatives lack reasoning capability to make them attain the level of an expert system. This work presents an intelligent framework for usable speech-enabled e-health system that provides speech-based health information to cater for the needs of those not catered for in graphical user interface. It also introduces rule-based reasoning technique into speech-based disease screening systems. A prototype application was developed to provide health information on malaria fever, yellow fever, typhoid fever and lassa fever, and also allows the caller to diagnose his kind of fever. This will enable the visually impaired, the blind, the low-literate and the computer illiterate access to the same health information available through the graphical user interface and offer a reasoning-induced speech-based disease diagnosis.