10 top tips on using AI to make caring easier
- Linda Nguyen
- 2 days ago
- 6 min read
Updated: 1 day ago
As carers, our plates are often overflowing with all sorts of responsibilities. Managing medical appointments, sifting through the admin load, personal care - and the list goes on. But what if using AI (artificial intelligence) can save us from some of the emotional energy that comes with crafting emails? Or create personalised budget plans for us?
If we’re skeptical of AI, that’s completely okay too. In fact, almost 30% of carers in our community* are concerned about the increasing use of AI in everyday life. But following closely behind are 21% of whom are curious. Whether we fall in the ‘cautious’ or ‘curious’ pot, perhaps these 10 tips can inspire ideas to help us lighten the caring load.
*Mobilise Moments - a monthly survey we ask carers in our community
What is AI?
Let’s start with a brief description of what AI is.
AI (Artificial Intelligence) is technology that uses machine learning to train software “how to think” and make decisions. Unlike regular chatbots, AI can understand language, answer questions, follow instructions, and store these as memories. Something super handy since we can often find ourselves repeating things to care professionals.
We may already be familiar with popular AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini or Claude and some of us might already be using them. The fundamental way of interacting with all these tools is through written or spoken instructions - referred to as prompts. The quality and nature of these instructions is vital to getting what we need from any AI tool.
How to nail a good prompt
As mentioned earlier, a prompt is simply an instruction we give to an AI to get a response.
For example:
Imagine we have been given a really long document explaining about the condition of the person we are caring for.
We could ask an AI tool:
“Summarise this document for me, as someone caring for my partner. Use simple english and bullet points.”
The more information we give the AI, the better response we will get back. A good starting point is using the RICE framework where we include: Role, Instructions, Contexts, Restraints, and Examples in the prompt.
Here are a few more prompt examples we can try out to help us save time with our everyday tasks:
“Create a weekly care schedule for Mum who needs help with meals, medication, and bathing.”
“Write a polite message to reschedule Ben’s doctor appointment.”
“I feel stuck. Can you help me break my to-do list into manageable steps?”
“My Mum is diabetic but loves chocolate. Suggest different sugar-free chocolate brands for people with diabetes”
“List calming activities for a child with autism who comes home from school overwhelmed.”
It’s important to remember to share as much as we’re comfortable with sharing. Whilst the conversations are confidential, often free versions of an AI like ChatGPT will use our conversations to train how it responds in the future.
If we’re uncomfortable with this, double check if they have an “opt out” feature before using it. For example, with ChatGPT we can “opt out” by finding ‘Data Controls’ in the settings and turning off 'Improve model for everyone'.
10 top tips on using AI to make caring easier
Below, find 10 top ways of using AI that carers in the Mobilise Community have found useful. No pressure to use them all, simply pick one or two as a starting point.
Rage typing
When we’re in the midst of dealing with heightened emotions, it can be hard to write a message that is productive. “Rage typing” simply involves typing everything about a frustrating situation, including how we feel, into an AI tool and then asking it to refine the message we want to send. Adding in helpful instructions like:
“Rephrase my complaint below making it constructive and encouraging a positive outcome” or simply “make it nice!”
This way we’re not bottling our emotions and directing it towards something that will be more constructive for us.
“I love AI for that… angry writing and AI produces a calm and professional version. I'm going try voice mode next”
Prepare for an important meeting
This can be helpful if we have a meeting or call with social workers, a housing officer, our council, or need to liaise with healthcare professionals. We might want to let AI know what outcomes we want to achieve and have it help generate questions to ask.
“I use it to plan how I will ask our GP for help in a persuasive approach.”
For those of us who like to be extra prepared, we can ask it to “role play” the meeting so we have a rough feel for what to expect.
Treat AI like a personal friend
Using AI as a personal friend might not be for everyone and that’s okay. Some carers have shared success with using AI as a digital journal. Or that the person they care for have benefitted from chatting with AI when they’re not around.
“It has helped exponentially and in turn that has made caring easier for me as the three hour daily phone calls from him have reduced and he’s a lot happier”
"I use chat GPT to help me with changing patterns or trends I see in myself that I want to shift to something healthier. I wouldn't suggest it replaces therapy, but can do some really interesting deep dive reflection activities with helpful simple steps for making positive changes”
Use AI to translate letters or emails
We might find that Google translate isn’t the best at what it’s intended to do. And although AI is not perfect either, carers have shared that it’s definitely a much better experience.
We can also ask it to pick up on cultural differences, or to translate our message considering cultural sensitivities.
Using AI to translate big chunks of texts might be useful if we’ve moved countries, our parents are not so familiar with the language a doctor or service professional is using, or if a letter simply has too much jargon in it.
Create a low cost grocery shopping list
Thinking about what to add to the next grocery shopping list? AI can be great at generating lists of grocery items for particular stores like Aldi, Lidl or Tescos and their price ranges.
We might want to ask “what fruits or vegetables are currently in season”, and create a list around that. Or narrow it down further to only suggest brands that are low in sugar or low in carbs.
“Sometimes I ask AI to create a grocery shopping list for healthy recipes”
“You can ask it to adapt recipes if you or someone you're cooking for has an allergy”
“Just described the eating needs and habits of 3 members of my household and got great meal ideas”
Create budget templates (or any template)
Not only can AI be great at creating written responses but it can also generate images and spreadsheets - both of which can be super useful for budget templates (or any sort of template we need).
From there, we can ask AI to refine our templates further including what items we want to monitor or how often we should review our finances.
Ask for new entertainment suggestions
On top of the “serious stuff”, carers have shared that asking lighter questions like “I’m currently enjoying xyz, what other films, podcasts or songs like this would you recommend?” has been really fun.
“I love using Chat for film suggestions”
“I have used ai to summarise book chapters for a carers book club that I am in.”
Plan days out or travel itineraries
As carers, planning a day out or a holiday can come with quite a bit of mental exhaustion. But what if AI could take on some of the load here? We can ask it to recommend accessible places to visit, different transport options or disability schemes available - and of course, new food spots to try!
AI features in our inboxes
Depending on our email provider and the device we’re using, some of us have integrated AI features in our inboxes or apps. They can be useful to help summarise important emails, pull out certain documents attached or draft replies based on past conversations. So rather than looking for new AI, we can dabble around in what is already available.
For more admin hacks, see our article on admin top tips for busy carers.
Speak with AI in real-time
For those of us who are great speakers but not so much typers, speaking with AI in real-time can be a handy tool - a bit like Alexa or Siri. For example, after having a two way conversation with ChatGPT, talking through ideas, we can then ask it to summarise what we want said into a neat message.
Take a look at some other creatives ways we can use voice-enabled devices like Alexa to help with caring - and whether it’s worth investing in one.
Final thoughts
Whilst there are still cases of AI hallucinating (confidently giving us wrong answers), we have seen it improve significantly over the last year, such as adding sources to the facts it pulls from the web. Here’s a helpful takeaway shared by a carer in our community:
"AI with human. Don’t rely on it."
With this in mind, it’s important to remember that AI tools should never be relied on as a substitute for professional advice especially in areas like therapy, medical care or legal matters. In these cases, consulting a qualified expert is always the best course of action, as AI may still produce errors or lack the full context needed.
Give our Mobilise Assistant a go
On the topic of all things AI - we have our very own! Ask the Mobilise Assistant any questions related to caring, whether it be incontinence, carer burnout or discount for carers and get instant answers.
