Collaboration Technology for Real-time Treatment of Patients

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Phase 1 Quarterly Report

October 1 - December 31, 1993

Task 1 Demonstration of Computer-assisted Collaboration in Specialty Areas

The objective of this task is to demonstrate the usefulness of computer-assisted collaboration technologies in patient care, where the general practitioner in charge of a patient's care is not physically collocated with an appropriate expert consultant. This task will demonstrate remote consultation in two specific instances: 1) between a primary care obstetrician and a tertiary care perinatologist and 2) between a primary care provider and a tertiary care radiologist.

A. Current Status:

This project leverages the work done under the ARPA DICE program. Under that program, a multimedia conference system was developed. This system will be utilized in this task, and we are in the process of analyzing and designing the specific software that will meet the requirements of this task.

B. Work Accomplished During this Period:

During this phase, the major work included:

• initial design of the multimedia conference system;
• acquisition of public domain image processing software for use with X-ray images;
• acquisition of public domain video player software for use with sonogram images; and
• initial determination of user requirements.

Task 2 Collaboration Technology for Community Care Networks

Community health care primarily involves preventive and primary health care for community residents through the participation of individual practices, group practices, federally-funded clinics, community centers, and hospitals. Collaboration and cooperation among these multiple parties is essential for effective healthcare delivery. Limited resources and medical staff, coupled with the lack of proper health education and awareness among the population, make it difficult to provide healthcare in rural areas. The objective of this task is to develop a community care network that will allow a community of healthcare professionals to provide quality care to a rural population.

A. Current Status:

This project leverages the work done under the ARPA DICE program. Under that program, a mockup of a patient record interface was developed. This mockup is being used in this task to gather and to fine-tune requirements for the community care network and the services that such a system should provide to healthcare professionals. Initial planning of activities in this task was completed and communicated to the National Library of Medicine at a kickoff meeting on December 14, 1993, at CERC.

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B. Work Accomplished This Period:

The following work was completed in this reporting period:

• initial planning for this task;
• initiating negotiations with Valley Health Systems to join as a subcontractor; and
• gathering of requirements from Valley Health Systems and other medical professionals.

Task 3 Open Systems Architecture for Collaboration in Health Care

The objective of this task is to develop a domain-specific reference architecture for statewide collaboration in the health care domain that can serve as a model for promoting the use of such technology. Through direct experience with the experimental tasks, Tasks 1 and 2, we expect the architecture to evolve in its construction over the course of the project.

A. Current Status:

This effort is in the early stages of development. Task members are researching literature on the Department of Defense's Domain Specific Software Architecture and are conducting experiments with potential elements of the architecture to be developed in this task. We have devised a plan for the early validation of the bottom-up approach that we have adopted for this project.

B. Work Accomplished This Period:

The major work during this period included:

• detailed planning of this task. The resulting plan and some preliminary software demonstrations were presented to the National Library of Medicine at a kickoff meeting on December 14, 1993, at CERC;
• preparation of an outline and a partial draft of a paper on the reference architecture;
• conduction of experiments with several potential system components, including integration of a graphical user interface tool (TK/TCL) with the Polylith software bus;
• performance of quality assurance work on the Software Packager;
• initial acquisition and formalization of domain knowledge from West Virginia University Hospitals and Valley Health Systems. This work included preparation of a draft document outlining high-level services that are required;
• planning of an in-house training course in some of the basic techniques of several proposed architecture elements.

Task 4 Integration of Patient Care Information Legacy Systems

The objective of this task is to demonstrate open and easy access to patient information from legacy hospital information systems. This task is now focusing on integration at Cabell Huntington Hospital (CHH).

A. Current Status:

This task has not begun as of this reporting period. Negotiations are nearly complete to hire TDS Healthcare Systems Corporation as a subcontractor to perform this task.

B. Work Accomplished This Period:

None

http://www.cerc.wvu.edu/nlm/artemis/project_reports/p1q1.html
September 3, 1997, by Mary Carriger

Copyright © 1997 Concurrent Engineering Research Center