IBM Helps Ling Tung University Build System To Monitor And Analyze Patients' Health At Home

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Article Date: 23 May 2009 - 1:00 PDT

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IBM (NYSE: IBM) announced it has been selected to help Ling Tung University build a smarter healthcare system to monitor the health of senior citizens in Taiwan anywhere, at anytime. The project is part of the university's "Health-4U" program, which has been launched as response to the Senior U-Care Flagship Program initiated by the Department of Industrial Technology under Taiwan's Ministry of Economic Affairs.

Like other developed societies, Taiwan is facing problems associated with an aging population, so improving healthcare coverage for senior citizens has become more pressing than ever. According to Taiwan's Council for Economic Planning and Development, Taiwan will become an "ultra-aging society" by 2025 when the number of citizens aged 65 years and older accounts for 20 percent of the total population. Today, more than 10 percent of Taiwan's population is aged 65 years or older.

As part of the collaboration, Ling Tung University has launched the first phase of a homecare network platform based on IBM Maximo Asset Management software. In the first step, the University has created an end-to-end healthcare monitoring platform where vital physiological data such as height, weight, body temperature, blood pressure, pulse, sugar and cardiogram can be recorded and analyzed continuously and presented via text or image. The data can also be connected with systems managed by other homecare information providers and relevant social or government organizations.

According to Jhih-ming Chen, Ph.D. Director, Department of Information Networking and System Administration, Ling Tung University, "The management of senior citizen's health requires monitoring, recording, maintenance, repair, follow-up and reporting, and these process and related data are closely intertwined. Collecting, preserving and analyzing such important data is critical for a vibrant healthcare system. IBM technology, based on open standards, allows us to easily connect with other peripherals and medical devices as well as to information and expert systems."

The software is also being used as the foundation of the university's Open Service Gateway Initiative (OSGi). This enables medical professionals to automatically transmit warning signs to elders and their families whenever it notices abnormalities in physiological data.

Ling Tung University and IBM also will collaborate on the design of an "anonymous attestation structure" which will be integrated with Ling Tung University's call center system to construct a modern homecare structure.

Source: IBM