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News: Newsletter 43

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March 28, 2007

In this newsletter:

  • Take a few minutes to complete your Med-e-Tel registration...
  • RTX Healthcare presents the new RTX3370 Telehealth Monitor at Med-e-Tel
  • Field test of diabetes tele-health platform shows significant impact on HB1Ac reduction, patient satisfaction, productivity increase and cost reduction
  • ETSI workshop at Med-e-Tel 2007: Human factors and user experience design guidelines for telecare services
  • Quality enhancement in emergency medicine through wireless wearable computing
  • Robots to aid child care experiences in the hospital setting...and beyond
  • Optimizing collaboration among eHealth projects in low resource settings
  • News from ISfTeH
  • News from the Med-e-Tel media partners
  • Newsbriefs


Gain quick access to Med-e-Tel 2007 by submitting your registration and payment now at www.medetel.lu/index.php?rub=visitor&page=registration_step1. It literally only takes two minutes to complete the form and will avoid having to go through the registration formalities upon your arrival at the event. You can review the registration conditions at www.medetel.lu/index.php?rub=visitor&page=fees_conditions. Advance pre-registration will be available until April 7th. After that date, registration will have to be done on-site at the event itself. If you have any questions, contact us at .
For program details, see www.medetel.lu/index.php?rub=educational_program&page=program. A preliminary list of exhibitors is available at www.medetel.lu/index.php?rub=exhibitor&page=exhibitors_sponsors).
If you still need to make hotel reservations for your stay in Luxembourg during Med-e-Tel, you are advised to do so now! Room availability is becoming limited. See www.medetel.lu/index.php?rub=hotel_travel&page=hotel_info for a list of official hotels and a reservation form.


RTX Healthcare will present the new RTX3370 Telehealth Monitor at Med-e-Tel. It is an interactive and simple to use device, designed specifically to improve the way of providing healthcare to patients outside hospitals suffering from chronic diseases such as heart failure, COPD, diabetes and other chronic diseases.
"The RTX3370 Telehealth Monitor is targeting the disease management and home healthcare industry to monitor chronically ill patients at home," says Bjarne Flou, Managing Director of RTX Healthcare. "The uniqueness of our product is that it is offered as a system device which interoperates directly with our clients Clinical Information Systems. Our business model is based on hardware sales, compared to most other competing solutions in the industry, where the devices are tied up to a proprietary infrastructure and the business model are based on a monthly fee, fee per user and likewise."
Swiss Centre for Telemedicine Medgate, a provider of disease management and telehealth services, is among the first customers to integrate the RTX3370 into their portfolio of telehealth offerings. "The reason why Medgate decided to work with RTX and chose the RTX3370 Telehealth Monitor, was that the RTX3370 is a strong and powerful means of engaging especially elderly patients actively in our health programs," says Andy Fisher, CEO of Medgate. "The simplicity, appeal and flexibility of this product is unique. Furthermore, the way Medgate and RTX work together allows us to customize our offerings exactly to our needs."
The RTX3370 engages the patients through personalized daily interactions and questionnaires while collecting vital signs. The vital signs, such as weight, blood pressure and blood glucose information, are transmitted seamlessly via Bluetooth, InfraRed or RS232 from industry standard wired or wireless peripheral biomedical devices to the RTX3370. All peripheral devices are standard of-the-shelf products from third party industry leading suppliers. Data are sent through the regular telephone systems and the global Internet, to the clients own Clinical Information System using open standards such as Webservices and SSL128. Other unique features of the RTX3370 Telehealth Monitor include a large easy to read color display, simple bottoms and speaker for vocalization of the patient dialogue.
For more information visit RTX Healthcare at Med-e-Tel (stand 1C-56). You can also already preview the device at www.rtxhealthcare.com.


From the Health Insurance perspective, results from field tests have shown a reduction of the number of patient days by 30%, an average decline of hospitalization by 17% and 88% satisfaction on the side of the professionals. From the patient's perspective, therapy-loyalty has increased with 27%, client-satisfactionrate was 82% and HB1Ac has decreased with 0,7% (from 7.9 to 7.2). Scientific validation of these results will be available by the end of June 2007.
The goal is to help more clients with diabetes, reducing costs and improving quality of life. Using the Impact Care's tele-health platform with the embedded video telephony over the TVscreen, Meavita (an elderly care organisation in The Netherlands with 20,000 employees) significantly reduces the number of face to face contacts. This new way of working enables the same team to treat 300-500% more patients with the same number of staff. Impact Care is the service provider who offers the tele-health platform enabling Meavita to provide self-management services for its chronic care patients.
Visit Impact Care at Med-e-Tel (stand 1C-36), or contact Dirk Devos at or call on +31 622 565 138 for more information and to schedule an appointment at Med-e-Tel. Also plan to attend presentations from Rolien de Jong, Head of Innovative Services at Meavita, scheduled in the Med-e-Tel opening session on Wednesday 18 April, and from Jan Ramaekers, CEO of Sananet, scheduled on Friday 20 April (see www.medetel.lu/index.php?rub=educational_program&page=program).


Telecare can give chronically or temporarily dependent people the choice to continue living at home, greater mobility, more self-reliance, reduced anxiety, and the possibility of alerting a carer in the case of an emergency. Telecare services can therefore reduce the need for institutionalization or hospitalization, helping to counter the escalating health costs of our ageing society.
Although undeniably useful, telecare services are not yet widely spread and in general use. Important factors hindering their acceptance are complex issues of trust, complicated or unsuitable usability and accessibility and in general, designs that do not sufficiently take the full user experience of the service or equipment into consideration.
The European Telecommunication Standards Institute (ETSI) has therefore set up Specialist Task Force 299 (STF299) in January 2006, co-sponsored by the European Commission and the European Free Trade Association. Its aim is to elaborate an ETSI Guide providing design, development and deployment guidelines for optimizing the user experience of telecare services. The guidelines will be of interest to all stakeholders and user groups in the telecare delivery chain, including:
- Clients (end users);
- Informal carers (family, neighbours);
- Formal carers (nurses, social workers etc);
- Health and social care institutions;
- Home surveillance and alarm service suppliers;
- Local and national health and social boards;
- Equipment manufacturers and suppliers;
- Network providers.
Among the user experience elements addressed are the trust, user interaction and service aspects of telecare services, including:
- User confidence in the equipment and service;
- Ethical and legal issues;
- Security and confidentiality issues;
- Accessibility of equipment for those having physical, sensory or cognitive impairments;
- Usability of telecare equipment and services;
- Ease of installation, setup, initial configuration, and maintenance;
- Integration with and adaptation to the client's cultural background and social environment;
- Integration with the existing organizational structure of the healthcare system;
- Suitability of equipment or service for mobile users.
ETSI STF299 herewith invites representatives from all eHealth and telecare stakeholders to participate in a workshop on "Human Factors and User Experience Design Guidelines for Telecare", in order to review, discuss and express their opinion and requirements on the draft set of design guidelines. The workshop will consist of a detailed presentation, review and discussion of the latest draft being produced by ETSI STF299. The workshop will ensure important input to the work of the STF team, industry-wide consensus building and help to focus its recommendations to the needs of the stakeholders. The workshop is scheduled for Wednesday 18 April in the afternoon. See www.medetel.lu/index.php?rub=educational_program&page=program for complete Med-e-Tel conference program schedule.


The main priorities of emergency medicine are to rescue lives and to limit as much as possible the damage to life and limb of the patient. The emergency physician, employing an emergency rescue vehicle (ERV) or an emergency rescue helicopter (ERH), analyzes the situation at the accident scene, chooses the appropriate first aid methods as well as the follow-on medical techniques at the hospital. The emergency accident protocol, required by law, is usually completed by hand and after the patient has been transferred to the emergency room. This makes an optimal preparation for the reception of the injured person impossible and delays the necessary therapeutic measures. It is a challenge for the emergency physician to follow the legal obligation for protocolling all relevant medical events and keep the quality of care of the patient at the highest possible level.
The goal of CANIS - the Carinthian Notarzt (emergency physician) Information System - is the development of an Emergency Patient Care Report Form (EPCRF) to establish and optimize a wireless and bidirectional information stream between the ERV/ERH and the receiving hospital.
Learn more about this on the Med-e-Tel expo (stand 1C49) from the Carinthian Tech Institute (FH Kaernten) and partner company ilogs, and attend their workshop at Med-e-Tel on Thursday 19 April in which CANIS will be presented in more detail (see www.medetel.lu/index.php?rub=educational_program&page=program).


A hospitalization is a serious physical and mental occurrence, especially for children. It brings them in situations which are completely different from what they are used to at home. In a hospital, children's experiences are more limited due to the closed and protective environment. These situations and limitations lead to many difficulties and special needs, which the ANTY project will try to improve by creating a special friend visiting the children.
The Robotics & Multibody Mechanics research group (R&MM) and Electronics and Informatics department (ETRO) at the University of Brussels (VUB), together with the ANTY Foundation, have started up the ANTY project (http://anty.vub.ac.be) to address the above challenges. They are creating a robot called "Probo" which will be used as a tele-interface to interact with the children on three different levels: entertainment, communication and medical treatments. The R&MM research group will take care of the mechanical part of the robot, whereas ETRO will focus on the aspects of vision, hearing and speech.
The development and construction of a first prototype has started and is hoped to be available towards 2008. The prototype will support the further growth of the project. Alongside the technical research possibilities, the prototype will be used to examine the opportunities for using ANTY in medical, social and psychological research. This research will provide relevant feedback to optimize the prototype towards a useful "social" robot.
The main technical research areas are: vision, speech, A.I. and mechanical design focusing on intrinsic safety. Concerning the research in the medical areas, the possibilities in Robot Assisted Therapy will be explored. And the research in social and psychological areas, will focus on child-robot interaction and emotional communication.
Meet ANTY representatives at Med-e-Tel next month to find out more about the project and the current achievements. For more information contact .


A special workshop and debate at Med-e-Tel on the topic of "Optimizing collaboration among eHealth projects in low resource settings" will bring together funders, implementers and people working in low resource settings (developing countries), to present and discuss actually implemented projects and workable solutions.
Contributions from some of the following organizations are expected: Rays of Hope Foundation (Switzerland), University of Queensland (Australia), Swinfen Charitable Trust (UK), HealthSpan International (USA), Inveneo (USA), Aga Khan Health Network, International Institute for Communication & Development (The Netherlands), Institute of Tropical Medicine (Belgium), as well as some others.
The session will continue with a round table discussion among participants and a demo of the successful "iPath" and "iTeach" telemedicine tools.
A useful contribution will be made by a representative of the Swiss Office of Foundation Oversight "Foundations/NGOs: Factors in Success or Failure, and Suggestions to Avoid Known Pitfalls."
Dr. Pramod Gaur, Chairman of the American Telemedicine Association Industry Council will contribute from his considerable experience of "do's" and "don'ts" of project formulation management, and will provide comments from the perspective of the larger funders and industrial suppliers.
The session will be completed by a presentation of other relevant viewpoints on the subject, from national and international organizations like WHO, ITU, WABT, ISRO/ANTRIX. Questions and answers will then be encouraged from the assembly floor.
The overall purpose of this session is to examine real-life experienced pluses and minuses which will affect the agreed need to promote project collaboration through sharing of identified ICT and other enabling resources common to eHealth Projects. The wrap up at closing will seek to summarize suggestions for collaboration-optimizer activities to which all can subscribe.
The workshop is scheduled for Friday 20 April. See www.medetel.lu/index.php?rub=educational_program&page=program for complete Med-e-Tel conference program, or contact for more information.


In this section of the Med-e-Tel newsletter, we report news from the ISfTeH (International Society for Telemedicine & eHealth), supporting partner of the Med-e-Tel event.
- This week, the 3rd International Conference on Telemedicine, organized by Donetsk State Medical University (R&D Institute of Traumatology and Orthopaedics, Department of Informatics and Telemedicine) and the Department of Health Care Management of Donetsk Regional State Administration, and supported by the ISfTeH, is taking place in Ukraine. Full program details are available at www.telemed.org.ua/Seminar/eng/2007e/index_e.html.
- Meet ISfTeH representatives and members on the ISfTeH stand (1C-10) at Med-e-Tel (Luxembourg, 18-20 April 2007) and learn how you can become part of this growing network of telemedicine and ehealth specialists and what it can do for you. The ISfTeH will also be presenting a conference session at Med-e-Tel on "International Telemedicine & eHealth Initiatives and Developments", focusing on the current state of telemedicine and ehealth in several countries in Europe and around the globe.
Information available on the ISfTeH stand, will a.o. include contributions from:
* Association for Ukrainian Telemedicine and eHealth Development
* Austrian Scientific Society for Telemedicine and eHealth
* Danish Society for Clinical Telemedicine
* Georgian Telemedicine Union
* German Society for Telemedicine
* Institute of Tropical Medicine, Antwerp, Belgium
* MedCom, Denmark
* Medical Association of Sao Lourenco do Sul, Brazil
* Sociedad Venezolana de Telemedicina and eHealth
* Society for Medical Informatics of Bosnia and Herzegovina
* Society for Telemedicine and eHealth in Nigeria
* Telemedicine Center of Kaunas University of Medicine, Lithuania
* Telemedicine Society of India
- The 12th ISfTeH International Conference is scheduled for 2-3 November 2007 in Chennai, India, to take place together with the 3rd National Conference of the Telemedicine Society of India (TSI), ISfTeH's national member from India. Information is available from http://tsi.org.in/conference/default.asp. Chairman of the Conference Organizing Committee, Prof. Krishnan Ganapathy of the Apollo Telemedicine Networking Foundation, is also scheduled for an Opening Keynote at Med-e-Tel 2007.
- For more information or to become an ISfTeH member, see www.isft.net or send an e-mail to .


For information on publications, journals, magazines, reports and on-line information services that will help you to stay abreast of what is going on in the field of ehealth and to make better informed decisions in your daily business or healthcare practice, check out the list of Media Partners on www.medetel.lu. To follow is a review of just some of the publications that will be featured at Med-e-Tel 2007:

- IHE (International Hospital Equipment & Solutions) is Med-e-Tel's main international media partner. To learn more about IHE as well as about the markets and areas served by IHE with its regular 27,000+ high quality BPA audited circulation, check out the IHE website at www.ihe-online.com.

- E-HEALTH-COM is the independent magazine for health telematics and telemedicine. It features current developements in the eHealth sector as well as technical specifications. Furthermore, E-HEALTH-COM presents the protagonists of the scene. Acknowledged experts among the authors, the editorial staff and the advisory board, assure highest competence.
E-HEALTH-COM keeps you up-to-date and covers important issues of the future. E-HEALTH-COM offers an essential communications-platform for the eHealth-Community.
For more information, contact , go to www.e-health-com.eu, or pick up your complimentary copy of the magazine at Med-e-Tel.

- Healthcare IT News Europe provides comprehensive, breaking news coverage of European healthcare IT developments. You will find updated daily news from an award-winning editorial team of U.S. and European-based correspondents at www.HealthcareITNews.eu, as well as headlines from other top IT Web sites. Sign up to receive Healthcare IT News Europe, a weekly e-newsletter delivered across the European continent to healthcare IT professionals at hospitals, medical practices, healthcare payers, vendors, regional and national policymakers, and consultants.

- Future Healthcare provides an invaluable service to the physicians and healthcare professionals by evaluating the new and emerging technologies and therapies, whilst examining how these innovations will impact the end-users who are committed to increasing levels of patient care. The quarterly journal combines the resources of Analysts in Media, with the leading medical associations, and world-class editorial from the key opinion leaders who are shaping the future of the medical industry, to deliver an informed and concise guide on purchasing choices to the healthcare decision-maker. Future Healthcare is essential reading for its 35,000 physicians, senior executives, hospitals, and clinics throughout the US, that are at the forefront of purchasing decisions in healthcare. More information can be found at www.futurehealthcareus.com.

- The Royal Society of Medicine Press is providing information in the Med-e-Tel Media Corner about the Journal of Telemedicine and Telecare, which is widely regarded as the leading journal in the field. To browse the Journal of Telemedicine and Telecare table of contents back to 1996 or to download a free sample issue, go to www.rsmpress.co.uk/jtt.htm.

- IOS Press is an international STM publishing house of books and journals in a wide range of fields, including medical science, artificial intelligence, rehabilitation, physics and computer science. Information about Technology and Health Care (Official Journal of the European Society for Engineering and Medicine) and other relevant IOS Press publications and books will be provided in the Med-e-Tel Media Corner. More info at www.iospress.nl.

- Informatics in Primary Care aims to provide information, help and guidance to all those concerned with information technology and information management in primary care, both nationally and internationally. Informatics is a new and exciting discipline, cutting across medicine, nursing, computing, technology, communications, education, statistics, psychology and sociology, but its primary purpose is the application of information and communications technology to support health care. For more information on the journal, visit www.radcliffe-oxford.com.

- Telemedicine and e-Health is a peer-reviewed journal covering all aspects of clinical telemedicine practice, technical advances, enabling technologies, education, health policy and regulation and biomedical and health services research dealing with clinical effectiveness, efficacy and safety of telemedicine and its effects on quality, cost and accessibility of care. For more information and to view a free sample issue online, go to www.liebertpub.com/tmj.


To follow are links to some interesting and recently published articles and studies (if you would like to suggest an article for inclusion into a following newsletter, feel free to send details to ):

  • Internet-Based Home Monitoring and Education of Children With Asthma Is Comparable to Ideal Office-Based Care: Results of a 1-Year Asthma In-Home Monitoring Trial (Pediatrics)
  • Home access to NHS records plan; Patients are set to be able to look at their medical records on their home computer, it has been announced. (BBC News)
  • Opinion: Caring for boomers requires increasing number of home care nurses (The Detroit News)
  • New Pervasive Systems Centre Could Make Independent Living A Reality (Medical News Today)
  • Diabetes Update: Implantable Glucose Monitoring? (Home Health Products)
  • The costs and potential savings of a novel telepaediatric service in Queensland (BioMed Central)
  • Robotic home help (BCS)
  • Telemedicine initiative for sub-Saharan Africa: pilot projects proposed (ESA)
  • HMC’s telemedicine robot provides immediate access to stroke specialist (Huron Daily Tribune)
  • One in Three Americans Say Internet Has Changed the Way They Manage Health Care: Study (Home Health Products)
  • Impact on Quality of Life of a Telemedicine System Supporting Head and Neck Cancer Patients: A Controlled Trial During the Postoperative Period at Home (Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association)
  • Digital 'counselor' minds your meds (The Boston Globe)

 
 

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