Yes it is! According to research, "Approximately 850 million people worldwide are estimated to have kidney disease, most of whom live in low-income and lower-middle-income countries" Francis, Anna, et al. "Chronic kidney disease and the global public health agenda: an international consensus." Nature Reviews Nephrology (2024): 1-13. And "CKD is expected to become the fifth global cause of death by 2040" (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36153901/ Diekmann, Fritz, et al. "CKD: The burden of disease invisible to research funders." Nefrologia, 2022, 42, 1, 65-84 , 2023).

If you suffer from chronic kidney disease, CKD-AI can be helpful to you in the following areas (see video demo on YouTube https://youtu.be/H_cwLqvSF5g):

Real-time Dietary Guidance: When a patient is at a restaurant, unsure about a menu item's kidney-friendliness, they can ask CKD-AI and get an immediate, informed response, making dining decisions less stressful and safer.

Understanding Lab Results: CKD-AI can interpret and explain lab results anytime, easing anxiety around understanding complex medical data and promoting better patient engagement in their healthcare.

Medication Management: CKD-AI can answer questions about medication interactions, side-effects, and schedules, reducing the risk of medication errors and promoting adherence. 

Yes it is! The large language model on which CKD-AI is based was trained on millions of articles of medical data written by doctors and researchers. In one case, the GPT-4 model underlying our app was reported to have "passed the US medical licensing exam with flying colors — and diagnosed a 1 in 100,000 condition in seconds” (Insider), a better performance than many real doctors, and its remarkable capabilities and promise in this and other areas of medicine/healthcare has been acknowledged in a number of peer reviewed studies, including this one. Other research articles that substantiate the growing acceptance and use of AI in nephrology and healthcare can be found in our medical research repository page for doctors. Nonetheless, our terms of use advise patients to always use CKD-AI in conjunction with advice from their personal healthcare provider.

CKD-AI addresses the following patient problems:

1. Lack of Personalized, Timely Information: CKD patients, especially those recently diagnosed, often have numerous questions about their condition, diet, medications, and lab results. However, healthcare professionals, burdened by high patient loads, are often unable to provide timely and personalized responses, causing frustration and fear. 

2. Inaccessibility of Healthcare Professionals: In instances of immediate decision-making, such as determining the kidney-friendliness of certain food items, the unavailability of doctors (24/7) for immediate consultation can lead to poor choices, compromising patient health and well-being. 

3. Need for Continuous Support: CKD management requires continuous patient support and education. The intermittent nature of doctor appointments and the complexity of information provided leaves patients feeling overwhelmed and unsupported in between visits.

Costs that can result from CKD sufferers not having a resource like CKD-AI include the following:

Time: Patients and caregivers spend considerable time researching, often finding contradictory information that further confuses them.

Money: Poor management of CKD due to insufficient knowledge can lead to health complications, increasing medical costs and/or caregiver costs.

Frustration and Anxiety: The lack of clear, consistent information and support leads to increased stress and anxiety, significantly impacting mental health. 

Other sources you may turn to for information or answers on your CKD condition may be well-meaning but inadequate for the following reasons:

They're Not Real-Time or Personalized: Patient education during appointments is limited by doctor's time and workload, and other sources do not offer real-time, personalized guidance (e.g., results from a Google search).

Lack of Trustworthy and Consistent Information Online: Online resources may provide contradictory information, causing confusion and anxiety to the patient or caregiver.

Accessibility and Continuity Issues: Healthcare professionals cannot be continuously accessible (24/7) for individual patient/caregiver queries and support. 

Other chatbots may be inadequate for CKD sufferers for the following reasons:

ChatGPT: Free users are locked out when system is at capacity, a situation no CKD patient with an urgent query needs to be in, and paid subscription for more uptime cost $20 per month, a price most patients cannot afford.

Google Bard: Some sources have reported a significant propensity for errors, a particularly costly one being reported by CNN when it was launched. Inaccurate answers are not acceptable risks for CKD sufferers. CKD-AI answers without errors and even encourages users to double check answers with their healthcare provider in the terms of use on its Login/Sign up page.

Microsoft BingAI: Tends to force user to start a new topic when asked to many questions and reportedly becomes confused by too many questions, something that is not helpful for a CKD patient or caregiver who might have many questions. CKD-AI stays on topic for as long as the user wants. 

A noteworthy advantage of CKD-AI against those other chatbots is that it restricts the user from asking questions that are not related to CKD, minimizing the potential for distraction from a full focus on their health while using this bot as opposed to the others. 

By logging in or registering, you agree that the chatbot (CKD-AI) will only be used as a supplementary resource, in conjunction with advice from your own doctor or nephrologist, and not as a replacement for professional medical guidance. You also agree that you will always consult a healthcare professional before making any decisions regarding your kidney health or treatment plan. Please be advised that CKD-AI does not retain any of your personal health data.

Yes. Signup and use is free for now and for as long as we can afford it. Organizations can also make the chatbot free for their members with a license. Such a license, for health centers, hospitals, and others, is available for purchase through this Stripe page of the developer's own  AI company, AI TECH PRODUCTS. Use without license is prohibited. If you are getting care from any organization for your CKD, you can draw their attention to this license from which you and other patients can benefit.

Yes. CKD-AI accepts inputs, questions, prompts in any language and answers in the user's native language. Please note, however, that while GPT-4, the model on which CKD-AI is based, is most proficient in English, and while it can understand and generate text in other 26 or more languages such as Spanish, French, Italian, German, Dutch, etc., the quality of the responses can vary. For languages that are under-represented in the data GPT-4 was trained on, the responses could be slightly less linguistically accurate but still essentially reliable.Yet, CKD-AI's multilingual ability means virtually most people can use it regardless of the language they speak.

Like its relative ChatGPT, CKD-AI may at very rare times hang or pause in generating an answer. To complete the generation, simply type 'continue' in the prompt box. It will not likely try to answer a question outside of its training if a user asks one, but to help it to better serve you just stick to CKD-specific questions. If you ask a question or input a prompt and it does not answer, just click F5 or refresh your browser page to get the bot back on track.