Design considerations for clinical data management in an integrated remote medical system

Abstract

In this paper, we present a proposal for the design of a telemedicine system. The system (called SIMPA) will be used for noninvasive monitoring of some vital parameters of patients with chronic diseases. MATERIAL AND METHODS: The telemedicine system contains a fixed unit and some mobile units. The mobile unit contains various sensors used to gather data about vital biosignals, a transceiver and a medical processor. On the fixed unit side, the host transceiver must be compatible with the mobile transceiver. On the server side, an application analyzes and processes the data and further stores it in dedicated databases. RESULTS: The database support for the telemedicine application is ensured by open source technologies and already available communication infrastructures (GSM networks). The requirements for the application were thoroughly analyzed and the Entity-Relationship diagram of the system was designed and translated into relational model. SIMPA will be implemented using only free and open source technologies, which will ensure a low cost and improved extensibility and portability. CONCLUSION: We presented some design considerations for a low-cost telemedicine system. The system will help optimize medical decisions and will increase the quality of the medical act and lower the cost, to the ultimate benefit of the patient.