Optimization of a handwriting recognition algorithm for a mobile enterprise health information system on the basis of real-life usability research

Abstract

Optimizing data acquisition in mobile health care in order to increase accuracy and efficiency can benefit the patient. The software company FERK-Systems has been providing enterprise mobile health care information systems for various medical services in Germany for many years. Consequently, the need for a usable front-end for handwriting recognition, particularly for the use in ambulances was needed. While handwriting recognition has been a classical topic of computer science for many years, numerous problems still need to be solved. In this paper, we report on the study and resulting improvements achieved by the adaptation of an existing handwriting algorithm, based on experiences made during medical rescue missions. By improving accuracy and error correction the performance of an available handwriting recognition algorithm was increased. However, the end user studies showed that the virtual keyboard is still the preferred method compared to handwriting, especially among participants with a computer usage of more than 30 hours a week. This is possibly due to the wide availability of the QUERTY/QUERTZ keyboard. © 2012 Springer-Verlag.