Studies in Health Technology and Informatics

Background: Standards have become available to share semantically encoded vital parameters from medical devices, as required for example by personal healthcare records. Standardised sharing of biosignal data largely remains open. Objectives: The goal of this work is to explore available biosignal file format and data exchange standards and profiles, and to conceptualise end-To-end solutions. Methods: The authors reviewed and discussed available biosignal file format standards with other members of international standards development organisations (SDOs). Results: A raw concept for standards based acquisition, storage, archiving and sharing of biosignals was developed. The GDF format may serve for storing biosignals. Signals can then be shared using FHIR resources and may be stored on FHIR servers or in DICOM archives, with DICOM waveforms as one possible format. Conclusion: Currently a group of international SDOs (e.g. HL7, IHE, DICOM, IEEE) is engaged in intensive discussions. This discussion extends existing work that already was adopted by large implementer communities. The concept presented here only reports the current status of the discussion in Austria. The discussion will continue internationally, with results to be expected over the coming years

Conceptualization and evaluation of interoperable and modular IT-framework components for exchanging big data information sets

Tese submetida à Universidade de Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro para obtenção do Grau de Doutor em Engenharia Electrotécnica e de ComputadoresUnder the term ”digitization 2.0” smartphones, tablets, smart watches and wearable sensors are generating huge amounts of data in context of the Internet of Things. Companies and research institutions are investigating and using these massive amounts of data in terms of research. There are expectations that combining data from different domains like for example healthcare, environment or transport, might lead to new findings for improving several aspects of life like better treatment of diseases or improving efficiency of the care path. However, a huge challenge is the diversity of data formats. Related syntactic and semantic requirements represent very important quality factors to make data exchangeable and comparable. This work investigates the applicability of interoperability standards and methods from the medical IT domain to data from other domains like transport and environment, to foster the exchange and improve data quality by using international standards. Hence, in this work open data platforms and formats were analyzed, medical interoperability standards and related technologies were collected and selected according to well defined criteria. Based on that, a concept called ”Interoperable BDIS Directory” (IBD)-Profile was developed for the exchange of Big Data Information Sets (BDIS). The IBD-Profile is based on HL7 FHIR and RESTful web services and includes process descriptions and HL7 FHIR resource definitions. In three technical feasibility studies (transmitting fitness tracker data, pollen exposure data and public transport data) prototypes were implemented and successfully tested with conformance tests by using HL7 FHIR validation tools Finally, verification of the developed concept was done through performance of an experts review according to IEEE 1028. The experts review confirms the developed concept to be meaningful and that the IBD-Profile is a successful first step to introduce interoperability for this purpose. However, further investigations of the concept should be done regarding integration of streaming-requirements as well as improved inter-connection of distributed data sources and sinks.Sob o termo ”digitalização 2.0”, smartphones, tablets, relógios inteligentes e sensores de vestuário (wearables) são capazes de gerar enormes quantidades de dados no contexto da Internet das Coisas. As empresas e instituições de investigação estão a usar essas enormes quantidades de dados em diferentes temas de pesquisa. Há expectativas de que a combinação de dados de diferentes domínios, como por exemplo, saúde, meio ambiente ou transporte, possa levar a novas descobertas para melhorar vários aspetos da vida, tais como o melhor tratamento de doenças ou a melhoria da eficiência do atendimento na prestação de serviços. No entanto, um grande desafio é a diversidade de formatos de dados. Requisitos sintáticos e semânticos associados aos dados representam fatores de qualidade muito importantes para os tornar passíveis de troca e comparáveis. Este trabalho investiga a aplicabilidade de padrões e métodos de interoperabilidade do domínio da informática médica a dados de outros domínios, como transporte e meio ambiente, para promover o intercâmbio e melhorar a qualidade dos dados, utilizando padrões internacionais. Para tal foram analisadas plataformas de dados abertas e foram recolhidas e selecionadas de acordo com critérios bem definidos normas de interoperabilidade médica e tecnologias relacionadas. Em consequência, um conceito denominado ”Interoperable BDIS Directory” (IBD) -Profile foi desenvolvido para a troca de conjuntos de grandes quantidades de informação - Big Data Information Sets (BDIS). O perfil do IBD é baseado nos serviços web HL7 FHIR e RESTful e inclui descrições de processo e definições de recursos HL7 FHIR. Em três estudos de viabilidade técnica (transmissão de dados de aplicações de acompanhamento de exercício físico, dados de exposição ao pólen e dados de transportes públicos) foram implementados protótipos e feitos com sucesso testes de conformidade por ferramentas de validação HL7 FHIR. Por fim, a verificação do conceito desenvolvido foi feita através do desempenho de uma revisão de especialistas de acordo com o IEEE 1028. A revisão de especialistas confirma que o conceito desenvolvido é relevante e que o Perfil IBD é um primeiro passo bem-sucedido para introduzir a interoperabilidade com os objetivos desejados. No entanto, é necessário continuar a investigação do conceito no que diz respeito à integração de requisitos de streaming, bem como à melhoria da interligação de fontes e consumidores de dados distribuídos

The adolescence of electronic health records: Status and perspectives for large scale implementation

Health informatics started to evolve decades ago with the intention to support healthcare using computers. Since then Electronic health records (EHRs) and personal health records (PHRs) have become available but widespread adoption was limited by lack of interoperability and security issues. This paper discusses the feasibility of interoperable standards based EHRs and PHRs drawing on experience from implementation projects. It outlines challenges and goals in education and implementation for the next years