MEDICAL DEVICE HAVING A REMINDER FUNCTION

• US 20120075085A1
• Filed: 06/07/2010
• Published: 03/29/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 06/12/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Lifeline Systems Company (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Original Assignee: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Inventors: Buisman, Harm Jacob
• Granted Patent: US 8,912,895 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 340/309.7
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/00 Measuring for diagnostic purposes radiation diagnosis A61B6/00; diagnosis by ultrasonic, sonic or infrasonic waves A61B8/00; Identification of persons
• CPC Class Codes: A61J 2200/30 Compliance analysis for taking medication
• CPC Class Codes: A61J 7/0472 of the count-down type, i.e. counting down a predetermined interval after each reset
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 10/20 for electronic clinical trials or questionnaires
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/67 for remote operation

Abstract

There is provided a medical device having a reminder function, the medical device comprising a reminder generator for issuing a reminder to a user to perform a predetermined action with the medical device; and a controller for selecting the reminder from a plurality of available reminders and for controlling the reminder generator to issue the selected reminder in accordance with a reminding schedule; wherein the controller is configured to maintain a measure of the effectiveness of each of said available reminders and to select the reminder from the plurality of available reminders based on said measures.

Claims

1. A medical device having a reminder function, the medical device comprising:

a reminder generator for issuing a reminder to a user to perform a predetermined action with the medical device; and

a controller for selecting the reminder from a plurality of available reminders and for controlling the reminder generator to issue the selected reminder in accordance with a reminding schedule;

wherein the controller is configured to maintain a measure of the effectiveness of each of said available reminders and to select the reminder from the plurality of available reminders based on said measures.

2. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the controller is configured to maintain a measure of effectiveness of each of said available reminders that is based on the average time difference between the issue of said reminder and the user performing the predetermined action.

3. A medical device as claimed in claim 2, wherein, after issue of a reminder, the controller is configured to update the measure of effectiveness for said reminder using

4. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the controller is configured to select the reminder from the plurality of available reminders having the highest measure of effectiveness.

5. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the controller is configured to select the reminder from a subset of the plurality of available reminders, the reminders in the subset having the highest measures of effectiveness.

6. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the controller is further configured to operate in a training mode in which the controller selects a reminder from the plurality of available reminders at random.

7. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the controller is further configured to operate in a training mode in which the controller selects a reminder from the plurality of available reminders that has been used the least times.

8. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the controller is configured to select the reminder from the plurality of available reminders statistically using the measures of the effectiveness and a random contribution.

9. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the controller is configured to select the reminder from the plurality of available reminders by using probabilistic selection in which each reminder has an associated probability of selection that is defined by a ratio between the measure of the effectiveness of said reminder and the sum of the measures of effectiveness for each of said reminders in the plurality of available reminders.

10. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the controller is configured to receive feedback from the user on one or more of the reminders in the plurality of available reminders and to update the measure of the effectiveness for each of said one or more reminders based on said feedback.

11. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein each of the reminders in the plurality of available reminders has one or more modalities selected from sounds, visual elements, vibrations and smells.

12. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the medical device is a medical monitoring device and further comprises at least one physiological characteristic sensor, wherein the reminder generator is for issuing a reminder to the user to take a measurement using the at least one physiological characteristic sensor.

13. A medical device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the medical device is a medicament dispensing device and further comprises a medicament dispenser, wherein the reminder generator is for issuing a reminder to the user to take a medicament from the medicament dispenser.

14. A method of operating a medical device, the method comprising:

determining that a reminder should be issued to a user of the medical device to remind the user to perform a predetermined action with the medical device;

selecting a reminder from a plurality of available reminders, the selection of the reminder being based on measures of the effectiveness of each of said reminders in the plurality; and

issuing the selected reminder to the user.

15. A method as claimed in claim 14, further comprising the steps of:

determining the time elapsed from the issue of the selected reminder and the user performing the predetermined action; and

updating the measure of the effectiveness of the selected reminder using the determined elapsed time.

16. A computer program product comprising computer readable code embodied therein, wherein the computer readable code is configured to cause a computer or processor to perform the method of claim 14.