Kakao Healthcare said Thursday that it has surpassed 200,000 members of “Care Chat,” a concierge service for university and general hospitals based on Kakao Talk channels and chatbots.

Care Chat was introduced to Ewha Womans University Seoul Hospital in August last year, followed by Ewha Womans University Mokdong Hospital, the Catholic University of Korea Seoul St. Mary's Hospital, Hanyang University Seoul Hospital, Hanyang University Guri Hospital, and Seoul National University Bundang Hospital.

Care Chat allows patients to add a “hospital channel” to their favorite hospital on KakaoTalk without installing a separate app, and handle various tasks through conversations with the chatbot.

It provides multiple functions, such as appointment and change, outpatient reception, waiting list, location guidance, and electronic questionnaire. Patients can use the chatbot on KakaoTalk, which they already use, to handle tasks previously handled through hospital call centers, offline receptionists, and separate hospital apps, enjoying greatly improved accessibility and convenience, according to Kakao Healthcare.

In July, Kakao Healthcare also introduced the “Digital Patient Card” feature to the Care Chat service for Seoul National University Bundang Hospital. The Digital Patient Card can be issued through Kakao Wallet and be used to verify patient identity, enter and exit the hospital, and handle hospital kiosk tasks using non-face-to-face QR authentication.

In the second half of this year, Kakao Healthcare plans to expand the scope to include outpatient services such as payment of medical fees, including automatic payment, parking fee settlement, issuance of credentials, and medication information, and inpatient services, such as hospitalization reservation, bed assignment, and QR access for guardians.

Kakao Healthcare will speed up the expansion of Care Chat by collaborating with more than 20 small and midsized enterprises specializing in healthcare IT, including Paymint, ezCaretech, and ONES Global.

“Kakao Healthcare will soon apply additional generative AI to Care Chat, a digital front door (out-of-hospital service), to further enhance the public's accessibility and convenience to hospitals,” Kakao Healthcare CEO Hwang Hee said. “We will continue to expand our services to university hospitals and general hospitals, and create a representative win-win model by collaborating with SMEs and startups.”