Skip to main content

Baidu releases Melody, a medical assistant chatbot to keep physicians humming

roup of medical staff at hospital, doctors team standing together
Dotshock/123RF
Chatbots had a rough start to 2016, with Microsoft’s Tay morphing from an AI sweetheart into a racist, sexist Holocaust-denier within a day.

But these bots have nonetheless become one of the most prevalent expressions of AI today. Everybody is betting on them — Apple with Siri, Microsoft with Cortana, and Amazon with Alexa. The language-training app Duolingo recently released a bot that helps users practice a new language through natural conversation. Meanwhile, medical assistant chatbots are popping up around the world.

Recommended Videos

Baidu, China’s largest search engine, today announced Melody the Medical Assistant, an AI-powered chatbot designed to converse with patients and collect data on their conditions to save physicians time.

baidu2
Baidu
Baidu
Please enable Javascript to view this content

“Baidu’s medical assistant uses deep learning to understand the patient’s initial query, and select additional questions to send to the user,” Wei Fan, senior director with Baidu Big Data Lab, told Digital Trends.

“We have learned from an extensive corpus of medical text knowledge from the web, from medical textbooks that doctor experts have written to train experienced doctors as well as other sources.”

Melody will be integrated into the Baidu Doctor app, which lets patients connect with their physicians to book appointments and ask questions regarding their medical condition. The bot will step in to query patients on things like the duration, severity, and frequency of their symptoms, and deliver this data to practitioners who can then make an informed decision on treatment. Like other companies in the chatbot realm, Baidu hopes its system can help alleviate doctor shortages around the world by freeing up physicians’ time for more essential tasks.

To anyone worried about AI encroaching on our daily lives, Fan wants to be absolutely clear that Melody will not some day replace physicians.

“The relationship between a clinician and their patient is sacred — we would never want to get between a doctor and a patient,” he said. “Instead, our goal is to help great doctors amplify their impact with a digital assistant that helps them automatically gather more information from the patient to save both the clinician and the patient time. Further, it is ultimately the doctor’s responsibility to make recommendations, and our goal is to provide to patients recommendations from great doctors.”

Dyllan Furness
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Dyllan Furness is a freelance writer from Florida. He covers strange science and emerging tech for Digital Trends, focusing…
The best health and fitness apps for iPhone in 2025: 15 best ones
Apple's Fitness app on the iPhone 14 Pro.

"Fitness" can mean a lot of things. For some people, it's being able to run far or fast. For others, it's being able to lift heavy things and lower them back down again. Others may simply want to keep trim or eat healthily. It may even mean getting a great night's sleep, or making sure your mental wellness is at its best. Whatever fitness means for you, we have a list of apps that cover all the possible bases. These apps excel in a number of different areas, but what they all generally have in common is that they use iOS' powerful tech to monitor and analyze your performance. As a result, they can help you progress along your fitness journey.

With 2025 now upon us, getting in shape -- and staying in shape -- is at the top of your list of New Year's resolutions. These apps will help you kick the new year off on a good foot and maintain your physical fitness for the rest of the year and every year after. You can pair the apps with other tech for best results, so make sure to check out our lists of the best fitness trackers and the best running headphones. Here are the best fitness apps for the iPhone in 2025.
Apple Fitness

Read more
GlassesUSA Black Friday Sale: Get 30% off prescription glasses
GlassesUSA frames close up with multiple styles.

Need a new pair of glasses? Want to stock up for your holiday trips before you head to meet up with your relatives? Typically, you'd have to wait until the official Black Friday event, the day after Thanksgiving, or maybe even Cyber Monday, but that's not the case this year. Alongside a variety of the best online glasses deals, GlassesUSA is hosting a huge Black Friday sale early, allowing you to save big on prescription glasses and frames with no waiting necessary. Of course, we always recommend browsing the sale of your own accord to see what's discounted because we couldn't possibly cover everything, nor could we know precisely what you're looking for. That said, we've called out quite a few of the best deals below.

What to shop in the early GlassesUSA Black Friday sale
Rightfully dubbed the Black Friday Early Bird sale, now's an excellent time to save up to 30% on prescription glasses. Moreover, GlassesUSA is truly dedicated to helping you find the perfect pair. Not only are there a ton of brands and styles to choose from, but you'll benefit from free shipping and returns and a money-back guarantee if you're not satisfied. You can even take to find the correct pair for your face. Ray-Ban, Oakley, DKNY, Prada, Ottoto, Muse, they are all here and available to shop, most discounted even. Men's and Women's eyewear are on sale, too, so there's something for everyone.

Read more
The best DNA testing kit Black Friday deals you can shop now
Daughter gifting Ancestry Gift Membership to family

DNA tests are awesome holiday gifts for your family. Together you can all build your family tree and discover your genetic makeup. Unfortunately the tests are pretty expensive, but at least you only need to test once. There are some nice Black Friday deals going on today that will save you a significant amount of money on single tests or bundles. Check out our favorite below, then more more deals worth checking out under that.
The best DNA testing kit Black Friday deal
AncestryDNA Genetic Test Kit -- $59, was $99

The single person AncestryDNA Genetic Test Kit is our pick for the best Black Friday deal already available. The kit normally costs $99, but right now it's down to just $59. That's a nice discount of $30 on one of the best DNA tests available. We're not sure how long this deal will last, so you should grab it soon.

Read more