Experiences Developing an AI Chatbot in the Pharmaceutical Industry
Chatbots have become prevalent in industries such as health and pharmaceutical. They make access to streamlined information easier and faster. With recent advances in large language models (LLMs), chatbots powered by LLMs offer new opportunities to improve access to information, including information about drugs. However, developing chatbots in pharmaceutical practice remains challenging due to safety and regulatory compliance requirements and the unique nature of the data in this domain. In this paper, we share our experience deploying an LLM-based chatbot to answer drug-related questions. We highlight the challenges we encountered developing the chatbot for a global pharmaceutical company. Among these challenges are ensuring that our chatbot retrieves reliable, up-to-date information from trusted sources and that its responses are trustworthy. We also share the strategies we adopt to overcome these challenges and the lessons we learn from deploying the chatbot. We believe these insights can guide the BoatSE and the broader software engineering community when deploying chatbots for highly regulated domains like pharmaceuticals.
Mon 13 AprDisplayed time zone: Brasilia, Distrito Federal, Brazil change
14:00 - 15:30 | |||
14:00 5mDay opening | Opening BoatSE | ||
14:05 40mKeynote | Keynote speech — Building an Internal Coding Agent at Zup: Lessons and Open Questions BoatSE | ||
14:45 15mTalk | Experiences Developing an AI Chatbot in the Pharmaceutical Industry BoatSE Samuel Abedu Concordia University, Saviour Owolabi University of Calgary, Mayra Sofia Ruiz Rodriguez Concordia University, Adam Yuen University of Calgary, Cedric Lim Ah Tock Concordia University, Ali Zaraket Sandoz, Ahmad Abdellatif University of Calgary, Emad Shihab Concordia University, Nahal Nasseri Sandoz | ||
15:00 15mTalk | Developer Challenges in the Adoption of Model Context Protocol in AI Agent Development BoatSE Oluwatoyosi Oyelayo Concordia University, Samuel Abedu Concordia University, SayedHassan Khatoonabadi Concordia University, Emad Shihab Concordia University | ||
15:15 15mTalk | Essence Coach: A Bot for Software Practice Adoption BoatSE | ||