EBO
Former NHS England Director and NHS Chief Executive, Richard Samuel, has joined EBO, a conversational AI vendor, as Director of Healthcare Strategy. He will lead a transformative initiative aimed at revolutionising the role of the patient in the reform of the NHS.
"Placing the person at the heart of the service and in control of their care is essential," says Richard.
The potential for health and care sector to harness AI and behavioural science to creating proactive, personalised, and scalable 'robot' conversations is enormous and a step we must take to elevate patient care and people’s experience to new standards of excellence.
This initiative aligns with the NHS Long Term Plan’s focus on prevention, early intervention, and patient empowerment. AI-based tools, like vaccination chatbots are already demonstrating huge success: Shropshire has reported a 40% increase in vaccination rates, and early data from NELFT suggests that DNAs can be reduced by as much as 20% driven by timely AI nudges and behavioural science principles.
Richard said: “I am raring to go with this initiative: to build a portfolio of autonomous 'patient healthcare navigators'. A critical success factor will be the support coming from within industry. We want to work with existing clinical suppliers in defining objectives and identifying behavioural barriers to piloting, evaluating, and refining conversational AI interventions”.
EBO’s CEO, Gege Gatt commented: “Richard Samuel brings a unique blend of NHS experience and AI expertise, making him ideally suited to spearhead this ambitious program. His vision is to incorporate behavioural insights within AI-powered systems to transform NHS care delivery. We look forward to seeing Richard’s leadership and the meaningful outcomes that will emerge from this groundbreaking program.
