Integration proposal through standard-based design of an end-to-end platform for p-Health environments

Abstract

Interoperability among medical devices and compute engines in the personal environment of the patient, and with healthcare information systems in the remote monitoring and management process is a key need that requires developments supported on standard-based design. Even though there have been some international initiatives to combine different standards, the vision of an entire end-to-end standard-based system is the next challenge. This paper presents the implementation guidelines of a ubiquitous platform for Personal Health (p-Health). It is standard-based using the two main medical norms in this context: ISO/IEEE11073 in the patient environment for medical device interoperability, and EN13606 to allow the interoperable communication of the Electronic Healthcare Record of the patient. Furthermore, the proposal of a new protocol for End-to-End Standard Harmonization (E2ESHP) is presented in order to make possible the end-to-end standard integration. The platform has been designed to comply with the last ISO/IEEE11073 and EN13606 available versions, and tested in a laboratory environment as a proof-of-concept to illustrate its feasibility as an end-to-end standard-based solution.