Health technology 

About: Health technology is an academic journal published by CRC Press. The journal publishes majorly in the area(s): Health care & Medicine. It has an ISSN identifier of 0891-1924. Over the lifetime, 701 publications have been published receiving 6545 citations. The journal is also known as: medtech & MedTech.

Google DeepMind and healthcare in an age of algorithms.

Abstract: Data-driven tools and techniques, particularly machine learning methods that underpin artificial intelligence, offer promise in improving healthcare systems and services. One of the companies aspiring to pioneer these advances is DeepMind Technologies Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Google conglomerate, Alphabet Inc. In 2016, DeepMind announced its first major health project: a collaboration with the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust, to assist in the management of acute kidney injury. Initially received with great enthusiasm, the collaboration has suffered from a lack of clarity and openness, with issues of privacy and power emerging as potent challenges as the project has unfolded. Taking the DeepMind-Royal Free case study as its pivot, this article draws a number of lessons on the transfer of population-derived datasets to large private prospectors, identifying critical questions for policy-makers, industry and individuals as healthcare moves into an algorithmic age.

Nanocomposites: a brief review

Abstract: Nanocomposite material consists out of several phases where at least one, two or three dimensions are in nanometer range. Taking material dimensions down to nanometer level creates phase interfaces which are very important for enhancement of materials properties. The ratio between surface area and volume of reinforced material used during nanocomposites preparation is directly involved in understanding of structure-property relationship. Nanocomposties offer opportunities on completely new scales for solving obstacles ranging from medical, pharmaceutical industry, food packaging, to electronics and energy industry. This paper presents main ideas behind nanocomposites and discusses matrix materials upon which nanocomposites can be divided in three classes; metal matrix, ceramic matrix and polymer matrix nanocomposites. The goal is to explain which raw material and technique is most suited for processing of a particular nanocomposites as well as application, advantages and drawbacks of nanocomposites. Nanotechnology is still in development and current limitations hinder global transition from macro-scale to nano-scale.

Electronic medical record systems: decision support examination framework for individual, security and privacy concerns using multi-perspective analysis

Abstract: Electronic medical record (EMR) is currently a popular topic in e-health. EMR includes the health-related information of patients and forms the main factor of e-health applications. Moreover, EMR contains the legal records that are created in the medical centre and ambulatory environments. These records serve as the data source for electronic health record. Although hospitals utilise the EMR system, healthcare professionals experience difficultly in trusting this system. Studies devoted to EMR acceptance in hospitals are lacking, particularly those on the EMR system in the contexts of privacy and security concerns based on multi-criteria perspective. Thus, the current study proposes a decision support examination framework on how individual, security and privacy determinants influence the acceptance and use of EMR. The proposed framework is based on a multi-criteria perspective derived from healthcare professionals in Malaysia as frame of reference. The framework comprises four phases. The sub-factors of individual, security and privacy determinants were investigated in the two initial phases. Thereafter, the sub-factors were identified with uniform multi-criteria perspective to establish a decision matrix. The decision matrix used individual uniform as basis to cluster the sub-factors and user perspectives. Subsequently, a new ‘multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) approach’ was adopted. Integrated technique for order of preference by similarity (TOPSIS) and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) were used as bases in employing the MCDM approach to rank each group of factors. K-means clustering was also applied to identify the critical factors in each group. Healthcare professionals in Malaysia were selected as respondents and 100 questionnaires were distributed to those employed in 5 Malaysian public hospitals. A conceptual model adapted from Unified theory of acceptance and use of technology 2 (UTAUT2) was employed to clarify the connection between individual, privacy and security determinants and EMR system acceptance and use in the selected context. After collecting the data sets (363), structural equation modelling was used to analyse data related to EMR acceptance and use. Results are as follows. (1) Five determinants (i.e. data integrity, confidentiality, non-repudiation, facilitating conditions and effort expectancy) exerted an explicit and important positive effect on EMR acceptance and use. (2) Three determinants (i.e. unauthorised, error and secondary use) exerted a direct and significant negative effect on EMR acceptance and use. (3) Three other determinants (i.e. authentication, performance expectancy and habit) insignificantly affected the behavioural intention of healthcare experts in Malaysia to use EMR.

Application of telemedicine and eHealth technology for clinical services in response to COVID­19 pandemic.

Abstract: Telemedicine and eHealth refer to the use of information and communication technology (ICT) embedded in software programs with highspeed telecommunications systems for delivery, management, and monitoring of healthcare services. Application of telemedicine have become timely while providing great potentials to protect both medical practitioners and patients, as well as limit social mobility of patients contributing to reduce the spread of the virus. This study employs data from the existing literature to describe the application of telemedicine and eHealth as a proactive measure to improve clinical care. Findings from this study present the significance of telemedicine and current applications adopted during the pandemic. More importantly, the findings present practical application of telemedicine and eHealth for clinical services. Also, polices initiated across the world to promote management of COVID-19 are discussed. Respectively, this study suggests that telemedicine and eHealth can be adopted in times of health emergency, as a convenient, safe, scalable, effective, and green method of providing clinical care.

A review on smartphone skin cancer diagnosis apps in evaluation and benchmarking: coherent taxonomy, open issues and recommendation pathway solution

Abstract: This research aims to review the attempts of researchers in response to the new and disruptive technology of skin cancer applications in terms of evaluation and benchmarking, in order to identify the research landscape from the literature into a cohesive taxonomy. An extensive search was conducted for articles dealing with ‘skin cancer’, ‘apps’ and ‘smartphone’ or ‘mHealth’ in different variations to find all the relevant articles in three main databases, namely, “Web of Science”, “Science Direct”, and “IEEE explore”. These databases are considered wide enough to cover medical and technical literature. The final classification scheme outcome of the dataset contained 110 articles that were classified into four classes: development and design; analytical; evaluative and comparative; and review and survey studies. Afterwards, another filtering process was achieved based on the evaluation criteria error rate within the dataset, time complicity and reliability, which are used in skin cancer applications. The final classification scheme outcome of the dataset contained 89 articles distributed in mapping and crossover with four sections concluded from 110 articles. Development and design studies, analytical studies, evaluative and comparative studies and articles of reviews and surveys comprised of 48.3146%, 22.4719%, 16.8539% (15), and 12.3595% (11) of the reviewed articles, respectively. The basic features of this evolving approach were identified in these aspects. We also determined open issues in terms of evaluation and benchmarking that hamper the utility of this technology. Furthermore, with the exception of the 89 papers reviewed, the new recommendation pathway solution was described in order to improve the measurement process for smartphone-based skin cancer diagnosis applications.