Background

Concurrently with the demographic challenges of later years, much attention has been given to the development of healthcare technologies that can support the process of transferring patients out of hospital to own home. Using novel information and communication technologies (ICT), Danish hospitals have succeeded in optimising treatment pathways by coupling traditional treatment procedures with technology-supported home monitoring and home care. However, ensuring high-quality treatment of patients in their own homes is still a matter that faces many challenges in terms of telemedicine software, both in relation to collection and processing of health data and in relation to exchange of data with other relevant systems within the health sector.

These challenges have been taken up by PhD Student Daniel Bjerring Jørgensen of University of Southern Denmark, who wishes to contribute to the solution of the data issue.

Vision and purpose

In cooperation with Patient@home, Daniel will develop an ICT infrastructure consisting of a number of components that support the collection and intelligent use of data. The development of these components include compliance with international standards, such as guidelines worked out by the Continua Health Alliance, which at national level have been selected as basis for exchange of health-related data in a telemedicine context, and to which Patient@home has pledged to adhere.

One of the key components of the said infrastructure is an ontology that describes existing or procurable knowledge about a patient by means of hardware and software applications integrated into the Patient@home infrastructure. The ontology is also the starting point of the user-modelling of telemedicine patients. The goal of user modelling is to create software that says the 'right' thing at the 'right' moment and in the 'right' way. To ensure that patients receive optimal treatment in their own homes, the project will develop an adaptive infrastructure for telemedicine, which, by means of user modelling, can adapt to each patient's preferences, habits and physical abilities.

An example of infrastructure adaptability and user modelling could be a reminder about daily activities, such as taking medicine, that is not forwarded at times when the patient wishes to be left undisturbed e.g. while sleeping or watching news on television.

Expected results

It is expected that the development of the adaptive software platform will enhance future telemedicine solutions' focus on the individual patient, and thus help to improve the quality of caretaking.