Ward and Team Led by Chen Publish Article on a Conversational Agent for Family Caregivers of Children With Chronic Health Conditions
Posted: 2026-10-14 14:17:12 (CSDE Research)
CSDE Affiliate Teresa Ward (School of Medicine) and co-authors, led by Dr. Weichao Yuwen (School of Nursing & Healthcare Leadership, University of Washington Tacoma) recently published a research article in the Journal of Medical Internet Research titled, “Development and Preliminary Evaluation of a Conversational Agent Delivering Problem-Solving Therapy for Family Caregivers of Children With a Chronic Health Condition: Multiphase Mixed Methods Study.” Family caregivers of children with chronic health conditions often experience substantial physical and mental health burdens, yet validated digital mental health tools tailored to them remain limited. The authors describe the iterative development of COCO (Caring of Caregivers Online), a conversational agent that integrates problem-solving therapy and motivational interviewing, progressing from rule-based interactions to a large language model-powered design across four phases. In usability testing with 38 caregivers, COCO achieved acceptable usability, and participants showed significant improvements in negative affect, sadness, guilt, and fatigue following a single session. The LLM-powered version showed the highest density of motivational interviewing techniques per turn, pointing to progressively improved conversational quality. The findings demonstrate the feasibility and usability of COCO as a source of therapeutic support for caregivers, and offer a structured framework for refining evidence-based therapeutic approaches through iterative testing before deploying large language models. The full article can be found here. Congratulations Dr. Ward, Dr. Chen, and team!