The Innovative Use of Intelligent Chatbot for Sustainable Health Education Admission Process: Learnt Lessons and Good Practices

Abstract

This article presents the methodology of creation of an innovative used by intelligent chatbots which support the admission process in universities. The lifecycle of the ontology, unlike the classical lifecycles, has six stages: conceptualization, formalization, development, testing, production and maintenance. This leads to sustainability of the chatbot, called Ana, which has been implemented at the “Iuliu Hatieganu” University of Medicine and Pharmacy from Cluj-Napoca during the admission session throughout July–September 2022, for international candidates. The sustainability of the chatbot comes from the continuous maintenance and updates of the ontology, based on candidates’ interraction with the system and updates of the admission procedures. Over time, the chatbot is able to answer the questions according to the present situation of the admission and the real needs of the candidates. Ana had a huge impact, succeeding to resolve a number of 5173 applicants requests, and only 809 messages was transferred to the human operators, statistics which show a high cost-benefit improvement in terms of reducing the travel expenses for the candidates and also for the university. The article also summarizes the good practices in developing and use of such an intelligent chatbot.