Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
functionality the SENIOR Framework introduces
a
Domain Specific Language (DSL)
. The DSL is
not a logical language itself. Its major goal is to
allow an intuitive definition of situations based on
if-then-expressions. The DSL allows to describe
situations and actions that are triggered, if a given
situation is detected properly. Simple actions can
be formulated directly by DSL statements, e.g.
display a message, while complex actions are
forwarded to other components.
For reasoning, an OWL-DL based reasoner,
such as Pellet (Pellet, 2011), can be used. Pellet
is optimized for common ABox reasoning. ABox
reasoning allows querying about individuals (ob-
jects) and their relationship to other individuals or
their properties (attributes). This is exactly what is
needed to conclude, whether the relations between
the objects hold and a described situation is true
or false. Concerning reasoning, performance is a
big issue. The runtime for validating expressions
grows disproportional with the amount of data to
reason about. Besides, the complexity of a reason-
ing expression, like the number of branches within
an expression, has an impact on the calculation
duration. Concerning (real-time) detection of
critical situations, the response time for detection
is a relevant criterion. Although most reasoners
implement strategies to cope with a high amount
of data and query complexity, they still lack per-
formance. Future tests will show how feasible the
SENIOR framework can be applied for real-time
situation detection. SENIOR is not able to compete
with hardware based detection systems (like fall
sensors with integrated emergency call), but can
be used to verify the plausibility of the detected
situations by these systems.
SENIOR was designed with the objective to
support and ease knowledge sharing among dif-
ferent domains. The ontology based approach for
describing data provides a basis for integrating
various sensors as well as different care-related
data from nursing homes and hospitals. As already
mentioned in the section Health Data Exchange
based on IHE, there is a still a gap concerning
information exchange between hospitals, nursing
homes and mobile home care services. SENIOR
supports the data exchange by allowing the in-
tegration of third party ontologies into its own
core ontology. The advantage is that the data is
based on an ontological model and can therefore
be transformed to meet IHE and Continua data
processing standards.
BENEFITS AND DRAWBACKS
An integrated approach enables healthcare pro-
viders to exchange care data gained by various
sensors in a space- and time-independent way. It
also guarantees cost savings due to the avoidance
of administrative efforts for multiple data acquisi-
tion. Many of the representatives of mobile nursing
and homecare services are looking forward to an
increased integration of patient-oriented informa-
tion and state the following advantages (Mayr &
Lehner, 2008a): (
i)
quick and simple availability
of information, (
ii)
available up-to-date care and
medication data, including the history and evolu-
tion, (
iii
) time saving through reduction of bureau-
cratic expense, and (
iv)
customized information
instead of a flood of information.
If an integrated system is IHE-compliant, it is
simple for healthcare organizations to establish
a cross-company data exchange. Systems, like
e-Care, result in better nursing care for elderly
people who require additional care - since it
ensures better communication. Therefore, elderly
people can enjoy a higher quality of life and rest
assured that - no matter who performs the service
of nursing care - their data is always
only
acces-
sible to the responsible nursing care professionals.
Elderly people benefit from the optimized in-
formation flow, because nurses are better informed
about the patients' current nursing care status and,
thus can be treated properly. Although the inte-
gration of healthcare by means of IT services is
not always welcomed by elderly people, various
approaches show that a structured and organized
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