INTERACTIVE PATIENT FORUMS

• US 20090326979A1
• Filed: 01/25/2008
• Published: 12/31/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 02/02/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Original Assignee: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Inventors: Ryan, John C.
• Granted Patent: US 8,615,408 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/2
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/021 Measuring pressure in heart or blood vessels A61B5/0205 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/67 for remote operation
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 80/00 ICT specially adapted for facilitating communication between medical practitioners or patients, e.g. for collaborative diagnosis, therapy or health monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/147 Communication arrangements, e.g. identifying the communication as a video-communication, intermediate storage of the signals selecting H04Q
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/15 Conference systems

Abstract

In a medical communication method, two or more persons are identified as having a selected medical condition or characteristic. At the residence of each identified person, a video conference-enabling unit (56) is operatively connected with a consumer electronics device (50, 52) disposed in the identified person'"'"'s residence. A video conference is conducted between at least two of the two or more identified persons using their respective consumer electronics devices (50, 52) and video conference-enabling units (56).

Claims

1. A medical communication method in which community members have a video conference-enabling unit (56) connected with a consumer electronics device (50, 52) disposed in the member'"'"'s residence, the medical communication method comprising:

identifying two or more of the community members having a selected medical condition or characteristic; and

conducting a video conference on a medically related topic between at least two of the two or more identified community members using their respective consumer electronics devices (50, 52) and video conference-enabling units (56).

2. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 1, further including:

at the residence of a community member, playing back pre-recorded audio/video content in accordance with a care plan schedule (44) for said community member, the playing back using at least the consumer electronics device (50, 52) and video conference-enabling unit (56) disposed in said community member'"'"'s residence.

3. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 2, further including:

transmitting the pre-recorded audio/video content to the video conference-enabling unit (56) disposed in said community member'"'"'s residence via the Internet (14) prior to playback.

4. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 1, further including:

prior to conducting the video conference, informing each of the identified two or more community member of medical privacy ramifications of participating in the video conference via the consumer electronics device (50, 52) and video conference-enabling unit (56) disposed in said community member'"'"'s residence.

5. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 4, further including:

conditioning each identified community member'"'"'s participation in the video conference on receiving an assent, informed by said informing, via the consumer electronics device (50, 52) and video conference-enabling unit (56) disposed in said community member'"'"'s residence.

6. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 1, wherein the conducting of the video conference includes:

communicating audio/video content recorded using at least the conference-enabling units (56) disposed in residences of participating identified community members to a multi-point control unit (10);

at the multi-point control unit, selecting content of the video conference including at least some of said communicated recorded audio/video content; and

transmitting the selected content of the video conference to at least participating identified community members.

7. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 6, wherein the transmitting further includes:

transmitting the selected content of the video conference to non-participating identified community members.

8. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 1, wherein the identifying includes:

providing a list of available video conferences to community members via consumer electronics devices (50, 52) disposed in the community member'"'"'s residences, the two or more community members having the selected medical condition or characteristic identifying themselves by selecting a video conference that is related to the selected medical condition or characteristic from the list of available video conferences (150).

9. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 8, wherein the conducting of the video conference includes:

connecting the self-identified two or more community members having the selected medical condition or characteristic to the selected video conference in an ad hoc manner either with or without the use of a multi-point control unit (10).

10. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 8, wherein the conducting of the video conference includes:

conducting an unmoderated video conference between the self-identified two or more community members having the selected medical condition or characteristic.

11. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 1, further including:

replaying in accordance with care plan schedules (44) selected pre-recorded medically related audio/video content for community members via the consumer electronics device (50, 52) and video conference-enabling unit (56) disposed in said community member'"'"'s residences

12. A medical forum comprising:

audio/video interfaces (40) disposed in residences of subjects, each audio/video interface including;

a consumer electronics device (50, 52) providing audio/video playback capability, and

a recording device (61) providing audio/video recording capability; and

a distributed medical server (10, 54) including a processor (54) disposed in each residence and operatively coupled with the audio/video interface of that residence, the distributed medical server being configured to perform a video conferencing process via a network (14) including;

receiving assent or rejection from a subject regarding joining a selected video conference, and

conditional upon receiving assent from the subject, providing the subject a participatory connection with the selected video conference by which the subject can view the video conference using the playback capability of the consumer electronics device (50, 52) disposed in the subject'"'"'s residence and can participate in the video conference by being recorded using the recording device (61) disposed in the subject'"'"'s residence.

13. The medical forum as set forth in claim 12, wherein the distributed medical server (10, 54) is further configured to, conditional upon receiving rejection from the subject regarding joining the selected video conference, provide the subject a viewing connection with the selected video conference by which the subject can view the selected video conference using the playback capability of the consumer electronics device (50, 52) disposed in the subject'"'"'s residence but is not recorded using the recording device (61) disposed in the subject'"'"'s residence.

14. The medical forum as set forth in claim 12, further including:

a moderator audio/video interface (12) including audio/video playback capability, audio/video recording capability, and one or more user inputs (28, 29) providing control of at least the video display content of the selected video conference.

15. The medical forum as set forth in claim 14, wherein the moderator audio/video interface (12) provides control to selectively display of (i) a selected participant or (ii) a selected graphic.

16. The medical forum as set forth in claim 14, wherein the moderator audio/video interface (12) is configured to receive quantitative data from participants.

17. The medical forum as set forth in claim 12, wherein the audio/video conference is unmoderated, and the distributed medical server (10, 54) further includes:

a current speaker disambiguation engine (140) that determines which participant of the video conference should be currently displayed.

18. The medical forum as set forth in claim 12, wherein the recording device (61) in each residence is integrated with a unit (56) in said residence that further contains the processor (54) of the distributed medical server (10, 54) disposed in said residence, the unit (56) being separate from and operatively connected with the consumer electronics device (50, 52).

19. The medical forum as set forth in claim 12, wherein at least one of the recording devices (61) include:

an automatic lens cover (63) that physically blocks a video recording lens except during audio/video recording.

20. The medical forum as set forth in claim 12, wherein the distributed medical server (10, 54) further includes:

data storage (20, 58) storing pre-recorded audio/video content and care plan schedules (44) corresponding to the residences, the distributed medical server being configured to play portions of the pre-recorded audio/video content to processors (54) in selected residences in accordance with the care plan schedules.

21. A medical communication system comprising:

audio/video interfaces (40) disposed in residences of subjects, each audio/video interface including;

a consumer electronics device (50, 52) providing audio/video playback capability, and

a camera (61) providing audio/video recording capability; and

a distributed medical server (10, 54) including a processor (54) disposed in each residence and operatively coupled with the audio/video interface of that residence, the distributed medical server being configured to;

play selected portions of pre-recorded audio/video content on the audio/video interfaces of selected residences in accordance with care plan schedules (44) for subjects residing in those residences, and

perform video conferencing in conjunction with selected processors and the network (14) in which selected subjects view the video conference using the playback capability of the consumer electronics device (50, 52) disposed in the subject'"'"'s residence and participate in the video conference by being recorded using the camera (61) disposed in the subject'"'"'s residence.

22. The medical communication system as set forth in claim 21, wherein the distributed medical server (10, 54) is further configured to (i) provide an automated notification of medical privacy ramifications of participating in the video conference, and to (ii) acquire an authenticated assent from each selected subject before enabling the selected subject to participate in the video conference.

23. The medical communication system as set forth in claim 22, wherein the distributed medical server (10, 54) is further configured to enable other selected subjects to anonymously view the video conference using the playback capability of the consumer electronics device (50, 52) disposed in the subject'"'"'s residence without participating in the video conference by being recorded.

24. The medical communication system as set forth in claim 21, wherein the distributed medical server (10, 54) supports a plurality of ongoing medically related video conferences that subjects join and exit in an ad hoc manner.

25. A medical communication method comprising:

pushing audio/video content to persons having a selected medical condition or characteristic via a video conference-enabling unit (56) connected with a consumer electronics device (50, 52) disposed in each person'"'"'s residence, the pushing being in accordance with a schedule (44) of a care plan for treating or managing the selected medical condition or characteristic; and

moderating a video conference on a topic related to the care plan, the video conference including as participants at least two of the persons having the selected medical condition or characteristic, the video conference being conducted using the participants'"'"' respective consumer electronics devices (50, 52) and video conference-enabling units (56) and being moderated using at least some equipment (10, 12) that is also used in the pushing of audio/video content.

26. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 25, further including:

scheduling the video conference including inviting at least some of the persons having the selected medical condition or characteristic based on at least one (i) being scheduled for the video conference by the schedule (44) of the care plan and (ii) the invitees'"'"' progress respective to the care plan.

27. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 25, further including:

scheduling the video conference including inviting at least some of the persons having the selected medical condition or characteristic, the number of invitees being constrained by a maximum participant limit.

28. The medical communication method as set forth in claim 25, wherein the video conference comprises a plurality of successive sessions, the method further including:

inviting the same group of invitees to all sessions of the video conference.