29th May 2008

The European Commission says it is helping develop technologies that could lead to significant advances for both doctors and the patients they treat. One example is the Akogrimo project, which is developing the potential of telemonitoring by developing a grid to bring diagnostic tools out of hospitals and into the field. The results of their work will potentially give paramedics and other mobile response units access to powerful tools previously beyond their grasp.

The Akogrimo project was designed to link not only organisations but also individuals, often using mobile devices. The grid can accommodate virtual organisations that are set up in advance for day-to-day tasks and also those that are created at very short notice, such as in a crisis situation.

Along similar lines, the PalCom project focused on reducing complications associated with technology. The researchers’ aim was to use so-called ‘palpable’ computing – pervasive computer technology that is also tangible and comprehensible to its users.

Such technology allows for a quick fix of communications breakdowns. The EU researchers behind the project are now applying the technology to help women through pregnancies and to improve the treatment of hip-replacement patients.

Another palpable computing system they are developing is aimed at enhancing post-surgery monitoring and will allow hip patients to leave the hospital 24 hours after surgery, rather than the current three or four days.

Keeping an eye on patients after they walk out of the surgery door may seem more like science fiction, but European doctors and technicians are perfecting a medical support system that can track patients’ real-time vital signs, link those to patient medical history, and, crucially, provide the latest clinical guidelines for patient care.

Better yet, the system can alert doctors in case a patient suffers a set back. The system is called Saphire, after the project of the same name. Saphire offers a range of services that combine scattered information stored across different systems into a new, more powerful application.

Researchers at another EU-funded project, BIOTEX, also developed a new method of monitoring patients in real-time. The researchers tapped into the ongoing development of smart fabrics to create items of clothing that can measure a wearer's body temperature, trace their heart activity, analyse body fluids, and providing another way to continually assess of someone's health.

“It's new and health care providers are not used to it,” says Jean Luprano, a researcher at the Swiss Centre for Electronics and Microtechnology who is also the project’s coordinator. “We are not used to the information that continuous, remote monitoring can provide – so different to the one-off laboratory tests that are usually taken. BIOTEX technology makes this remote monitoring possible, but more research into the links between these indicators and disease conditions and states will make it realistic."

Luprano expects continuous monitoring, made possible with smart textiles, to make a major improvement to the way doctors approach the treatment of metabolic disorders and leisure.

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