Stereo Vision 3D Tracking of Multiple Free-Swimming Fish for Low Frame Rate Video

3D multiple fish tracking has gained a significant growing research interest to quantify fish behavior. However, most tracking techniques have used a high frame rate that is currently not viable for real-time tracking applications. This study discusses multiple fish tracking techniques using low frame rate sampling of stereo video clips. The fish are tagged and tracked based on the absolute error of predicted indices using past and present fish centroid locations and a deterministic frame index. In the predictor sub-system, the linear regression and machine learning algorithms intended for nonlinear systems, such as Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS), symbolic regression, and Gaussian Process Regression (GPR), were investigated. Results have shown that in the context of tagging and tracking accuracy, the symbolic regression attained the best performance, followed by the GPR, i.e., 74% to 100% and 81% to 91%, respectively. Considering the computation time, symbolic regression resulted in the highest computing lag of approximately 946 ms per iteration, whereas GPR achieved the lowest computing time of 39 ms

The efficacy of knowledge management for personalised healthcare

This chapter examines some of the key issues surrounding the incorporation of the Knowledge Management (KM) paradigm for personalised healthcare. We discuss the complex nature of KM, some essential concepts necessary to make personalised healthcare a reality and introduce a schematic which illustrates the efficacy of KM for personalised health. © 2005 The authors

Telemedicine: The next healthcare delivery medium: Fad or future?

During the past two decades, advances in Information Technology (IT) particularly in database technologies, internet technologies and telecommunications have brought about a revolution in healthcare. These IT advances have enabled medical personnel to have round-the-clock access to clinical data irrespective of the geographic location of both medical personnel and clinical data. This in turn has led to the coming of age of a new medium of healthcare delivery - telemedicine. This paper explores the viability (in organisational, technological and financial terms) of the telemedicine concept. The main findings are as follows: (1) an analysis of the uptake of information and communication technologies within the healthcare sector indicates that, in the next 10-15 years, telemedicine is likely to emerge as an alternative medium for healthcare; (2) telemedicine will allow patients to carry out routine medical tests, reducing the number of visits to the physician and thereby reducing costs for routine consultations. Copyright © 2007 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd

How workflow management systems enable the achievement of value driven healthcare delivery

Healthcare institutions globally are currently having major problems accessing and maintaining the large amounts of data that are continuously being generated. Examination of the clinical procedures relating to patient management reveals that many of these activities are repetitive. Workflow Management Systems (WFMS) can automate these repeated activities. Moreover, the introduction of WFMS would enable healthcare institutions to face this challenge of transforming large amounts of medical data into contextually relevant clinical information and knowledge. In order to emphasise the dynamic connection between healthcare, workflow and internet technologies, the intelligence continuum is introduced. Copyright © 2007 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd

Providing secure mAccess to medical information

This paper provides the description of a pilot system, HERMES, which allows secure mobile access in geographically distributed medical databases. The HERMES system builds an environment where mobile medical personnel perform secure registration and acquisition of medical information. The system can be used as an overall medical communication system on which diverse medical applications could inter-operate and securely exchange data. Copyright © 2007 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd

Lean management for improving hospital waiting times—Case study of a Vietnamese public/general hospital emergency department

Introduction: Emergency departments (EDs) at public hospitals in Vietnam typically face problems with overcrowding, as well as being populated by a wide variety of illnesses, resulting in increasing dissatisfaction from patients. To alleviate these problems, we used the increasingly popular value-stream mapping (VSM) and lean strategy approaches to (1) evaluate the current patient flow in EDs; (2) identify and eliminate the non-valued-added components; and (3) modify the existing process in order to improve waiting times. Methods: Data from a total of 742 patients who presented at the ED of 108 Military Central Hospital in Hanoi, Vietnam, were collected. A VSM was developed where improvement possibilities were identified and attempts to eliminate non-value-added activities were made. A range of issues that were considered as a resource waste were highlighted, which led to a re-design process focusing on prioritizing blood tests and ultrasound procedures. On the administrative side, various measures were considered, including streamlining communication with medical departments, using QR codes for healthcare insurance payments, and efficient management of X-ray and CT scan online results. Results: By implementing a lean approach, the following reductions in delay and waiting time were incurred: (1) pre-operative test results (for patients requiring medical procedures/operations) by 33.3% (from 134.4 to 89.4 min); (2) vascular interventions by 10.4% (from 54.6 to 48.9 min); and (3) admission to other hospital departments by 49.5% (from 118.3 to 59.8 min). Additionally, prior to the implementation of the lean strategy approach, only 22.9% of patients or their proxies (family members or friends), who responded to the survey expressed satisfaction with the ED services. This percentage increased to 76.5% following the curtailment of non-value-added activities. Through statistical inferential test analyses, it can be confidently concluded that applying lean strategy and tools can improve patient flow in public/ general hospital EDs and achieve better staff coordination within the various clinical and administrative hospital departments. To the authors' knowledge, such analysis in a Vietnamese hospital's ED context has not been previously undertaken