Selecting healthcare information systems provided by third-party vendors: a mind map beyond the manuals.

The selection of a new healthcare information system (HIS) has always been a daunting process for clinicians, health care providers and policy makers. The objective of this study is to present the lessons learned and the main findings from several relevant case studies to support this process. Data were collected by retrospectively reviewing the summative results of three well-established systems, acquiring feedback from two E.

Predicting ICU survival: a meta-level approach.

Background: The performance of separate Intensive Care Unit (ICU) status scoring systems vis-à-vis prediction of outcome is not satisfactory. Computer-based predictive modeling techniques may yield good results but their performance has seldom been extensively compared to that of other mature or emerging predictive models. The objective of the present study was twofold: to propose a prototype meta-level predicting approach concerning Intensive Care Unit (ICU) survival and to evaluate the effectiveness of typical mining models in this context.

Collaborative work during interventional radiological procedures based on a multicast satellite-terrestrial network.

Collaboration is a key requirement in several contemporary interventional radiology procedures (IRPs). This work proposes a multicast hybrid satellite system capable of supporting advanced IRP collaboration, and evaluates its feasibility and applicability. Following a detailed IRP requirements study, we have developed a system which supports IRP collaboration through the employment of a hybrid satellite-terrestrial network, a prototype multicast version of wavelet based interactive communication system (WinVicos) application, and a partition aggregation and conditional coding (PACC) wavelet codec.

Clinical-oriented collaboration over the Web during interventional radiology procedures.

Multidisciplinary collaboration is a key requirement in several contemporary interventional radiology procedures (IRPs). We proposed a hybrid system (NetAngio) to enable "on the fly" heterogeneous collaboration to support IRP providing intraoperating essential services, and investigate its feasibility and effectiveness in a referral medical center. We have developed a Web-based, cost-effective structure, able to support real-time mentoring, image manipulation, and education services beyond the boundaries of the single institution and potentially allow sub specialists to participate in opinion and decision making in more complex cases.