The present application is generally directed to monitoring, updating, and facilitating patient care and wellbeing. Particularly, the present application relates to systems for providing a platform allowing for communication of updates, information, alerts, instructions, and other data in order to facilitate monitoring and management of a patient's care and wellbeing.
The background description provided herein is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Work of the presently named inventors, to the extent it is described in this background section, as well as aspects of the description that may not otherwise qualify as prior art at the time of filing, are neither expressly nor impliedly admitted as prior art against the present disclosure.
Various parties may be involved in or take an interest in the care and wellbeing of a patient, such as an elderly patient, a patient with a physical or mental incapacity, or other individual. Doctors, nurses, physical therapists, in-home caregivers, family members, friends, neighbors, and others may provide assistance in, or have an interest in, caring for or simply looking after the patient. It may be beneficial for the parties involved in or having an interest in a patient's care or wellbeing to communicate with one another and/or to have access to documents and information related to the patient's care or wellbeing. Such communication may be challenging where multiple parties having different roles or levels of interest and/or where parties are geographically separated. Moreover, it may be difficult to manage the various roles, tasks, and duties of the various individuals needed to facilitate care or monitor the wellbeing of a patient.
Thus, there is a need in the art for systems for improved monitoring and tracking of a patient's care or wellbeing. Particularly, there is a need for system through which a patient's family members, friends, doctors, caregivers, and other individuals having an interest in caring for or looking after the patient can securely access care data and communicate with one another regarding the patient's care or wellbeing.
The following presents a simplified summary of one or more embodiments of the present disclosure in order to provide a basic understanding of such embodiments. This summary is not an extensive overview of all contemplated embodiments, and is intended to neither identify key or critical elements of all embodiments, nor delineate the scope of any or all embodiments.
The present disclosure, in one or more embodiments, relates to a system for facilitating care of a patient. The system may have a database storing medical data for the patient, a platform communicatively coupled to the database, and a user interface accessible by one or more users. The platform may have an access control module for authenticating user credentials and for controlling read and write access for users by providing a plurality of assignable user access levels. The user interface may have a social page for facilitating communication between users, a medical page for accessing medical data for the patient, and a care team page for accessing data related to a care team, which may include one or more users. In some embodiments, each of the one or more users may have an assigned access level for each of the social page, medical page, and care team page. The plurality of user access levels may include an administrator access level, a family member access level, and a medical professional access level in some embodiments. The administrator access level may permit a user the ability to view, add to, edit, and delete content on each of the social page, medical page, and care team page. The administrator access level may further permit a user the ability to add and delete users from the care team and assign access levels for users. The family member access level may permit a user the ability to view, add to, edit, and delete content on at least the social page, and may restrict access to edit and delete content on the care team page. Further, the medical professional access level may permit a user the ability to view, add to, edit, and delete content on at least the medical page, and may restrict access to edit and delete content on the care team page. In some embodiments, the plurality of user access levels may include a friend access level, permitting a user the ability to view, add to, and edit content on the social page, and restricting access to edit and delete content on the medical page and care team page. In some embodiments, the social page may display communicative posts made by users. The one or more users may upload documents to the medical page in some embodiments. The platform may further include an analytics module for analyzing the medical data for the patient, and/or an alerts module for sending alerts to at least one of the one or more users. The user interface may include a medications page for accessing data related to current medications of the patient in some embodiments, and each of the one or more users may have an assigned access level for the medications page. Further, the user interface may have a biometrics page for accessing biometrics data for the patient, the biometrics data including data related to at least one of: the patient's blood pressure, the patient's blood sugar, the patient's daily activity, the patient's heart rate, the patient's temperature, the patient's weight, the patient's pain scale, the patient's oxygen saturation or use, the patient's CA 125, the patient's inhibin, and the patient's INR. Each of the one or more users may have an assigned access level for the biometrics page. The user interface may further include a calendar page for accessing scheduling data for the patient, and each of the one or more users may have an assigned access level for the calendar page. In some embodiments, the user interface may include a new page for accessing news data related to care of the patient, and each of the one or more users may have an assigned access level for the news page. Additionally, the user interface may have a legal page for accessing legal data for the patient, and each of the one or more users may have an assigned access level for the legal page.
The present disclosure, in one or more additional embodiments, relates to a user interface for facilitating care of a patient and providing one or more users with access to health data for the patient. The user interface may have a social page for facilitating communication among the users, a medical page for accessing the medical data for the patient, and a care team page for accessing data related to a care team, made up of one or more users. In some embodiments, access to the user interface may be controlled by a plurality of assignable user access levels, each user access level including, for each of the social page, medical page, and care team page, at least one of read and write permissions. The plurality of user access levels may include an administrator access level, a family member access level, and a medical professional access level. The administrator access level may permit a user the ability to view, add to, edit, and delete content on each of the social page, medical page, and care team page, and may further permit a user the ability to add and delete users from the care team page. The family member access level may permit a user the ability to view, add to, edit, and delete content on at least the social page, and may restrict access to edit and delete content on the care team page. The medical professional access level may permit a user the ability to view, add to, edit, and delete content on at least the medical page, and may restrict access to edit and delete content on the care team page. The plurality of user access levels may further include a friend access level in some embodiments. The friend access level may permit a user the ability to view, add to, and edit content on the social page, and may restrict access to edit and delete content on the medical page and care team page. In some embodiments, the user interface may have a medications page for accessing data related to current medications for the patient, and each user access level may have, for the medications page, at least one of read and write permissions. The user interface may further have a biometrics page for accessing biometrics data for the patient. The biometrics data may include data related to at least one of: the patient's blood pressure, the patient's blood sugar, the patient's daily activity, the patient's heart rate, the patient's temperature, the patient's weight, the patient's pain scale, the patient's oxygen saturation or use, the patient's CA 125, the patient's inhibin, and the patient's INR. Moreover, each user access level may include, for the biometrics page, at least one of read and write permissions. The user interface may include a calendar page for accessing scheduling data for the patient, and each user access level may include, for the calendar page, at least one of read and write permissions. The user interface may include a news page for accessing news data related to care of the patient, and each user access level may include, for the news page, at least one of read and write permissions. Further, in some embodiments, the user interface may include a legal page, and each user access level may include, for the legal page, at least one of read and write permissions.
While multiple embodiments are disclosed, still other embodiments of the present disclosure will become apparent to those skilled in the art from the following detailed description, which shows and describes illustrative embodiments of the invention. As will be realized, the various embodiments of the present disclosure are capable of modifications in various obvious aspects, all without departing from the spirit and scope of the present disclosure. Accordingly, the drawings and detailed description are to be regarded as illustrative in nature and not restrictive.
While the specification concludes with claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter that is regarded as forming the various embodiments of the present disclosure, it is believed that the invention will be better understood from the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying Figures, in which:
The present disclosure relates to systems for providing a platform for monitoring, updating, and facilitating patient care and/or monitoring an individual's wellbeing. The platform may be provided over a wired or wireless network and may allow various users to access, update, and communicate regarding a patient's medical care, activities, or overall wellbeing via a user interface. Users of the platform may be the patient, doctors, nurses, other caretakers or medical professionals, family members, friends, neighbors, or other individuals having an interest in a patient's or other individual's (each referred to herein simply as “patient”) care or wellbeing. Various users may have different levels of access through the user interface. The platform may provide access to information and documents related to the patient's care or wellbeing, such as medical records, prescription information, biometrics information, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA) documents and information, legal documents, and other documents and information. The platform may additionally provide access to schedule information for the patient or related to the patient's care or wellbeing, such as medication schedules, appointment times, and other events or appointments. The platform may provide means of communication among the users, and may have a social aspect. A platform of the present disclosure may allow individuals to monitor, update, and facilitate a patient's care or monitor wellbeing as a care team.
Turning now to
The user interface 110 may be or include a software program, application, website, or other electronic interface. Additionally, the user interface 110 may be accessible via a desktop computer, notebook computer, tablet, smartphone, personal digital assistant (PDA), smart watch, or other suitable computing device. The user interface 110 may allow users to communicate with one another and/or view, add, remove, or edit information about a patient, related to a patient, or related to users. The user interface 110 may provide different levels of access for different users in some embodiments.
The user 105 may access the platform via the user interface 110. In some embodiments, the user 105 may be part of a care team. A care team may be a group of individuals who care for a patient or who have an interest in the patient's health. The user 105 may be a patient, or any of the patient's doctor, nurse, caretaker, personal care assistant, other health professional, family member, friend, or neighbor, for example. In some embodiments, the system 100 may include multiple users 105. Users may have different levels of access through the user interface 110 in some embodiments. For example, a user 105 may be an administrator in some embodiments. An administrator may have access that includes the ability to view, add, edit, and/or delete data, for example. In some embodiments, an administrator may generally have full access rights. An administrator may additionally have the ability to add, edit, and delete access rights for other users. Other users may have different access rights. For example, some users may have add and edit capabilities but may not be able to delete particular elements. In some cases, a user may have view only access to all or to particular portions of the data accessible on the system 100. Other users may have different view, add, edit, and delete rights to portions of the data available on the platform.
As described above, the system 100 may have at least one database 120. The database 120 may store information related to a patient or care or wellbeing of the patient. Information in the database 120 may be accessible via the user interface 110. Information in the database 120 may be received from a user or from one or more other sources. The database 120 may store such information as a patient profile, user profile, medical data, legal data, communications between users, scheduling data, biometrics data, or other data related to care of a patient or to users of the system 100. In some embodiments, the database 120 may store HIPPA information. The system 100 may have more than one database 120 in some embodiments. For example, the system 100 may have databases for different types of information. The system 100 may have a HIPPA database for storing HIPPA-eligible data and documents, a prescription medications database for storing prescription medication data, and/or other databases in some embodiments.
In some embodiments, the system 100 may have a platform 130. The platform 130 may have hardware and/or software for monitoring, updating, and facilitating patient care. The platform 130 may be accessible via the user interface 110. The platform 130 may have one or more modules in some embodiments, such as an access control module 132, a patient data module 134, and an alerts module 136.
The access control module 132 may control access to the platform 130 and database 120 from the user interface 110. For example, the access control module 132 may verify user login information entered at the user interface 110. The access control module 132 may operate to restrict or control a user's access permissions based on preset settings or settings chosen by an administrator, for example. The access control module 132 may ensure compliance with HIPPA standards or practices in some embodiments. It may be appreciated that a system of the present disclosure is capable of complying with applicable HIPPA standards or practices.
The patient data module 134 may control display and dissemination of data such as patient data, medical data, biometrics data, or other data added, updated, or deleted by a user. For example, the patient data module 134 may receive posts, comments, or other data submitted or contributed by one or more users. The patient data module 134 may further display the posts, comments, or other data to users via the user interface 110.
The alerts module 136 may provide an alert to one or more users in response to particular events. For example, an alert may be provided to one or more users after a user edits, adds, or otherwise changes patient data or other data accessible from the system 100. In some embodiments, an alert may be provided to one or more users in response to a scheduling conflict. In some embodiments, an alert may be provided to one or more users in response to an event such as an apparent missed medication dosage, a contraindicated medication, an unusual or concerning biometric data point, or an emergency event. The alerts module 136 may send alerts to particular users based on the users' access levels in some embodiments. For example, where a user has view only access, that user may be excluded from receiving particular alerts. Alerts may be provided by various means, such as by a popup notification, text message, email, voice message, or other suitable alert means. In some embodiments, users may determine which alerts they receive and by what means they are received.
In some embodiments, the platform 130 may have other or additional modules or other components. For example, the platform 130 may have an analytics module for tracking and/or analyzing biometric or other health data. The analytics module may analyze medication data for medicine contraindications, unusual data points, data trends, or other information. Additionally or alternatively, in some embodiments, the platform 130 may have a news module for providing data from one or more news sources or other sources to users via the user interface 110. For example, a news module may provide access to updated healthcare news data from one or more sources.
The system 100 may generally allow one or more users 105 to monitor, update, and facilitate care or wellbeing of a patient. In this way, information and documents in the database and/or accessible via the user interface 110 may generally relate to the patient. In some embodiments, the system 100 may provide for facilitating care or wellbeing of multiple patients.
The patient vitals display portion 202 may display particular information related to the patient. For example, as shown in
At least some of the information displayed in the patient vitals display 202 may be derived from a patient profile.
Turning back to
The plurality of selectable tabs 206 may provide links for navigating throughout the user interface 110. The tabs 206 may differ based on the different information or documents available on the interface 110. In some embodiments, the tabs 206 may be customizable for a given patient or group of patients. The tabs 206 may each link to a particular page of the user interface 110. In some embodiments, as shown in
The social page, accessible by the social tab 210 and shown in
The documents 246 may be organized into digital folders 248 in some embodiments. Some examples of folders include health history, occupational therapy, dental, optometry/ophthalmology, progress notes, imaging reports, insurance information, advanced directives, surgical summaries, clinic visits, emergency visits, hospitalizations, labs and test results, primary and specialty providers, and physical therapy. Additional or alternative document folders 248 may be used as well. In some embodiments, some users 105 may have to ability to customize folders 248. For example, users 105 may choose folders 248 from a predetermined list and/or may create new folders, edit folders, and delete folders.
As shown in
In some embodiments, the biometrics page may be updatable by way of a device. For example, a blood pressure monitoring device, heart rate monitoring device, or other device used by the patient, a care taker, or a medical professional may send data to the system 100 via a Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, or other wired or wireless connection or network. In this way, some biometrics data may be continuously or periodically updated via the device. The data may be sent from the device automatically or may be sent by action of a user of the device.
As described above, different users 105 may have different access permissions through the user interface 110. It may be appreciated that access permissions may be set globally, such that a user has the same permissions for each page of the user interface 110 in some embodiments. In other embodiments, access permissions may be set for individual pages or tabs of the user interface 110. For example, some users may be permitted to add new posts or comments to the social page of the interface 110, accessible via the social tab 210, but may have more restricted view only access or no access to other pages of the user interface, such as the medications page accessible via the medications tab 216.
Additionally, aspects of the system 100 may be password protected or otherwise require user access information in some embodiments. For example, as described above, the user interface 110 may prompt a user for login information, such as but not limited to a username and password, before providing access to the system 100. Additionally or alternatively, particular tabs, pages, screens, windows, views, data, documents, communications, settings, or other elements may be password protected or otherwise require access information from at least some users. That is, in some embodiments, particular tabs, pages, screens, windows, views, data, documents, communications, settings, or other elements may be accessible only to users having an appropriate password or other verifiable access information. Some or all users, including in some embodiments users who otherwise have view, add, edit, and/or delete permissions for the particular element(s), may be prompted for a password or other access information to access such tabs, pages, screens, windows, views, data, documents, communications, settings, or other elements.
It may be appreciated that a system of the present disclosure may provide for improved monitoring and tracking of the patient's care or wellbeing and may allow for a team approach to care. Using a system of the present disclosure, family members friends, and other care team members, regardless of their physical location, may have convenient and secure access to care data and may be able to easily communicate with one another regarding the patient's care or wellbeing. Doctors, nurses, care givers, and other health professionals may have the ability to easily, securely, and privately communicate with the patient's family regarding the patient's care. Systems of the present disclosure may allow multiple parties to work together in the daily or ongoing care of the patient. Such systems may be particularly beneficial for elderly patients, patients in an assisted living facility, patients receiving in-home care, hospital patients, patients with a mental or physical disability, or other individuals receiving any type of medical care or assistance.
For purposes of this disclosure, any system, platform, or module described herein may include any instrumentality or aggregate of instrumentalities operable to compute, calculate, determine, classify, process, transmit, receive, retrieve, originate, switch, store, display, communicate, manifest, detect, record, reproduce, handle, or utilize any form of information, intelligence, or data for business, scientific, control, or other purposes. For example, a system or any portion thereof may be a personal computer (e.g., desktop or laptop), tablet computer, mobile device (e.g., personal digital assistant (PDA) or smart phone), server (e.g., blade server or rack server), a network storage device, or any other suitable device or combination of devices and may vary in size, shape, performance, functionality, and price. A system may include random access memory (RAM), one or more processing resources such as a central processing unit (CPU) or hardware or software control logic, ROM, and/or other types of nonvolatile memory. Additional components of a system may include one or more disk drives or one or more mass storage devices, one or more network ports for communicating with external devices as well as various input and output (I/O) devices, such as a keyboard, a mouse, touchscreen and/or a video display. Mass storage devices may include, but are not limited to, a hard disk drive, floppy disk drive, CD-ROM drive, smart drive, flash drive, or other types of non-volatile data storage, a plurality of storage devices, or any combination of storage devices. A system may include what is referred to as a user interface, such as the user interface 110, which may generally include a display, mouse or other cursor control device, keyboard, button, touchpad, touch screen, microphone, camera, video recorder, speaker, LED, light, joystick, switch, buzzer, bell, and/or other user input/output device for communicating with one or more users or for entering information into the system. Output devices may include any type of device for presenting information to a user, including but not limited to, a computer monitor, flat-screen display, or other visual display, a printer, and/or speakers or any other device for providing information in audio form, such as a telephone, a plurality of output devices, or any combination of output devices. A system may also include one or more buses operable to transmit communications between the various hardware components.
One or more programs or applications, such as a web browser, and/or other applications may be stored in one or more of the system data storage devices or databases. Programs or applications may be loaded in part or in whole into a main memory or processor during execution by the processor. One or more processors may execute applications or programs to run systems or methods of the present disclosure, or portions thereof, stored as executable programs or program code in the memory, or received from the Internet or other network. Any commercial or freeware web browser or other application capable of retrieving content from a network and displaying pages or screens may be used. In some embodiments, a customized application may be used to access, display, and update information.
Hardware and software components of the present disclosure, as discussed herein, may be integral portions of a single computer or server or may be connected parts of a computer network. The hardware and software components may be located within a single location or, in other embodiments, portions of the hardware and software components may be divided among a plurality of locations and connected directly or through a global computer information network, such as the Internet.
As will be appreciated by one of skill in the art, the various embodiments of the present disclosure may be embodied as a method (including, for example, a computer-implemented process, a business process, and/or any other process), apparatus (including, for example, a system, machine, device, computer program product, and/or the like), or a combination of the foregoing. Accordingly, embodiments of the present disclosure may take the form of an entirely hardware embodiment, an entirely software embodiment (including firmware, middleware, microcode, hardware description languages, etc.), or an embodiment combining software and hardware aspects. Furthermore, embodiments of the present disclosure may take the form of a computer program product on a computer-readable medium or computer-readable storage medium, having computer-executable program code embodied in the medium, that define processes or methods described herein. A processor or processors may perform the necessary tasks defined by the computer-executable program code. Computer-executable program code for carrying out operations of embodiments of the present disclosure may be written in an object oriented, scripted or unscripted programming language such as Java, Perl, PHP, Visual Basic, Smalltalk, C++, or the like. However, the computer program code for carrying out operations of embodiments of the present disclosure may also be written in conventional procedural programming languages, such as the C programming language or similar programming languages. A code segment may represent a procedure, a function, a subprogram, a program, a routine, a subroutine, a module, an object, a software package, a class, or any combination of instructions, data structures, or program statements. A code segment may be coupled to another code segment or a hardware circuit by passing and/or receiving information, data, arguments, parameters, or memory contents. Information, arguments, parameters, data, etc. may be passed, forwarded, or transmitted via any suitable means including memory sharing, message passing, token passing, network transmission, etc.
In the context of this document, a computer readable medium may be any medium that can contain, store, communicate, or transport the program for use by or in connection with the systems disclosed herein. The computer-executable program code may be transmitted using any appropriate medium, including but not limited to the Internet, optical fiber cable, radio frequency (RF) signals or other wireless signals, or other mediums. The computer readable medium may be, for example but is not limited to, an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, or semiconductor system, apparatus, or device. More specific examples of suitable computer readable medium include, but are not limited to, an electrical connection having one or more wires or a tangible storage medium such as a portable computer diskette, a hard disk, a random access memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory), a compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM), or other optical or magnetic storage device. Computer-readable media includes, but is not to be confused with, computer-readable storage medium, which is intended to cover all physical, non-transitory, or similar embodiments of computer-readable media.
As used herein, the terms “substantially” or “generally” refer to the complete or nearly complete extent or degree of an action, characteristic, property, state, structure, item, or result. For example, an object that is “substantially” or “generally” enclosed would mean that the object is either completely enclosed or nearly completely enclosed. The exact allowable degree of deviation from absolute completeness may in some cases depend on the specific context. However, generally speaking, the nearness of completion will be so as to have generally the same overall result as if absolute and total completion were obtained. The use of “substantially” or “generally” is equally applicable when used in a negative connotation to refer to the complete or near complete lack of an action, characteristic, property, state, structure, item, or result. For example, an element, combination, embodiment, or composition that is “substantially free of” or “generally free of” an ingredient or element may still actually contain such item as long as there is generally no measurable effect thereof.
In the foregoing description various embodiments of the present disclosure have been presented for the purpose of illustration and description. They are not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the invention to the precise form disclosed. Obvious modifications or variations are possible in light of the above teachings. The various embodiments were chosen and described to provide the best illustration of the principals of the disclosure and their practical application, and to enable one of ordinary skill in the art to utilize the various embodiments with various modifications as are suited to the particular use contemplated. All such modifications and variations are within the scope of the present disclosure as determined by the appended claims when interpreted in accordance with the breadth they are fairly, legally, and equitably entitled.