Considering the Context and Patient's Profile to Support Ubiquitous Healthcare Systems

Abstract

Customized suggestions often play a key role in areas in which they are applied. When applied to search engines, for example, customized suggestions tailor search results and services to users according to their interests, needs, behaviors, and many other factors. These suggestions work as filtering tools used to extract information and provide services that are most relevant to the particular user. The most important techniques customization systems depend on are the semantic search engines, contextual factors, user profiles and ontology. This paper proposes an approach to the customization of information and services based on user profile, context, and ontology. We tested the proposed system in the context of personalizing healthcare by considering three factors within a patient's profile—age, gender and history—as well as location (city) as contextual factors. Our system includes three customization processes that are implemented using a semantic search engine: 1) customization of diagnosis, which involves generating potential symptoms and diseases; 2) customization of treatment, involving generating patient-consistent medicines; and 3) customization of diagnosis for emergency cases. In addition, we developed an overall ontology as a reference. Our customized-healthcare system has been implemented and tested based on virtual patients' profiles by proposing several scenarios to verify its effectiveness and accuracy.