An Open, Ubiquitous and Adaptive Chronic Disease Management Platform for COPD and Renal Insufficiency
Funded under: FP7-ICT
Project reference: Grant Agreement n. 216461
Start date 1 February 2008 End date 31 May 2012
Keywords: Decision support system, Chronic disease monitoring, Clinical score card, Knowledge base editor
CHRONIOUS was a highly innovative ICT research initiative that aspired to implement ubiquitous health and lifestyle monitoring of people with chronic diseases at a European level.
The project proposed an adaptive and ubiquitous chronic disease management system that offers continuous monitoring of patients thanks to wearable or environmental sensors, data analysis and decision support facilities for healthcare providers and organisations.
Two use-cases were selected for testing CHRONIOUS solutions: chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and chronic kidney disease (CKD).
Objectives
The project worked for
- Raising the quality of life and providing highly qualified and efficient, holistic healthcare services to all EU citizens
- Advancing medical research through the provision of advanced prediction and diagnosis tools and the exploitation of the monitored parameters
- Reducing formal care burdens, improving formal care by reducing the patients visits for routine examinations
- Improving the informal care effectiveness without increasing intrusion
- Reducing costs of informal care, which is particularly high for people suffering from chronic diseases
- Involving the care recipient in health promoting activities and decision-making
- Penetrating neighboring future markets and creating new business opportunities
Qualifying elements
The solution developed in the project had the following distinctive features:
- Enabling the tele-monitoring of health parameters as well as environmental and social contexts
- Simple and friendly interfaces, suitable for the users most common profile
- New algorithms and methodologies for assessing information coming from the heterogeneous sensors
- New decision mechanisms and instruments aiming at enhancing both patients and physicians possibilities in deciding in real time how to react
- Collection and management of appropriate and validated medical knowledge
- Interoperability with existing systems based on common standards
Role in the project
SILab activities were performed within a task-force coordinated by CNR ICT Department that involved also the Institute for High Performance Computing And Networking (ICAR) and the Institute of Applied Mathematics and Information Technologies. The Lab core activities comprised the development of an ontological framework for COPD and CKD monitoring, of a knowledge base editing system and of the clinical decision support services addressed to care professionals. 