METHOD AND APPARATUS OF ASSESSING NEED FOR HEALTH CARE AND FACILITATING THE PROVISION OF HEALTH CARE

• US 20080215362A1
• Filed: 11/14/2007
• Published: 09/04/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 11/14/2006
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc. (Johnson & Johnson)
• Original Assignee: Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc. (Johnson & Johnson)
• Inventors: Voegele, James W., Murray, Michael A., Powell, Darrel M., Schiaparelli, Jill F.
• Application Number:
  US11/939,652
• Publication Number:
  US 20080215362A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/2
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/00 Administration; Management
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/20 for the management or administration of healthcare resources or facilities, e.g. managing hospital staff or surgery rooms
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 50/20 for computer-aided diagnosis, e.g. based on medical expert systems
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 50/30 for calculating health indices; for individual health risk assessment

Abstract

A health care assessment system and associated methods are provided for providing increased access to individuals for assessing whether a need exists for health care and then also facilitating an individual'"'"'s access to health care as needed. Embodiments of the system include a health care assessment system for receiving input from a patient and generating an output reflecting an indivdual'"'"'s risk of one or more disease states. The health care assessment system is further capable of providing resources for health care and visual tools for collecting patient history.

Claims

1. A method for assessing health risks of an individual comprising the steps of:

a) obtaining at least one health data input for the individual;

b) accessing a memory device that stores a health risk assessment database reflecting parameters of at least one individual health data;

c) performing an automated assessment of the individual'"'"'s at least one health data;

d) assessing the risk of a disease of the individual; and

e) reporting the risk of a disease to the individual in accordance with the health risk assessment data.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising a method of facilitating access to health care of the individual comprising the steps of:

f) accessing a memory device that stores a health care provider database;

g) performing an automated comparison of the risk of a disease of the individual and the health care provider data base; and

h) reporting a list of health care providers to the individual in accordance with the comparison of step b).

3. The method of claim 2 further comprising the steps of:

i) accessing a database that stores a health care provider scheduling database;

j) scheduling an appointment for the individual with at least one health care provider in accordance with the list of health care providers and the scheduling database.