GODART Uses Telehealth to Fight Diabetes in the Deep South

The Gamified Optimized Diabetes Management With Artificial Intelligence-Powered Rural Telehealth—GODART—project employs telehealth technologies to combat diabetes in rural, underserved areas, using natural language-understanding technology combined with gamification to reach communities in Alabama and other Deep South states with high rates of diabetes.

Researchers aim to assist patients handling their type 2 diabetes with physical activity, nutrition, and medication. GODART uses new techniques such as daily automated diabetes-related behavior monitoring, rewards for consistency in behavior monitoring, and artificial intelligence-powered health coaching calls. These methods aim to address several significant disparities in diabetes-related outcomes associated with suboptimal social determinants of health, including gaps in access to health services.

Leveraging scalable artificial intelligence-backed technologies to develop financially sustainable interventions that influence suboptimal social determinants of health is a key next step in improving diabetes management in the Deep South.

This study provides an opportunity to develop an optimized scalable intervention package that health systems could leverage to address diabetes and equitable access to health care simultaneously.

Patients with type 2 diabetes and health care professionals are invited to participate in one phone interview lasting a maximum of one hour to understand needs/preferences and perceptions about a telecoaching platform that will help to manage diabetes through nutrition and physical activity recommendations. Contact Tejossy John, MPH, for more information. 

Learn more about eligibility requirements. 

Principal Investigators: Tapan Mehta, PhD; Mohanraj Thirumalai, PhD

Project Manager: Tejossy John, MPH