Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dlnhk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T14:30:00.238Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Clinical Application of Mobile Technology to Disaster Medicine

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 August 2012

Timothy Case ,
Cecily Morrison  and
Alain Vuylsteke
Timothy Case*
Affiliation:
School of Clinical Medicine, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
Cecily Morrison
Affiliation:
Engineering Design Centre, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
Alain Vuylsteke
Affiliation:
Department of Anaesthesia and Intensive Care, Papworth Hospital, NHS Foundation Trust and Cambridge University Health Partners, Cambridge, UK
*
Correspondence: Timothy Case, MA, MPhil, MBBChir University of Cambridge - Hughes Hall Wollaston Road Cambridge CB1 2EW UK E-mail [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Mobile health care technology (mHealth) has the potential to improve communication and clinical information management in disasters. This study reviews the literature on health care and computing published in the past five years to determine the types and efficacy of mobile applications available to disaster medicine, along with lessons learned.

Five types of applications are identified: (1) disaster scene management; (2) remote monitoring of casualties; (3) medical image transmission (teleradiology); (4) decision support applications; and (5) field hospital information technology (IT) systems. Most projects have not yet reached the deployment stage, but evaluation exercises show that mHealth should allow faster processing and transport of patients, improved accuracy of triage and better monitoring of unattended patients at a disaster scene. Deployments of teleradiology and field hospital IT systems to disaster zones suggest that mHealth can improve resource allocation and patient care. The key problems include suitability of equipment for use in disaster zones and providing sufficient training to ensure staff familiarity with complex equipment. Future research should focus on providing unbiased observations of the use of mHealth in disaster medicine.

Case T, Morrison C, Vuylsteke A. The Clinical Application of Mobile Technology to Disaster Medicine. Prehosp Disaster Med. 2012;27(5):1-9.

Keywords

communicationdisastermass-casualty incidentmHealthmobile
Type
Comprehensive Review
Information
Prehospital and Disaster Medicine , Volume 27 , Issue 5 , October 2012 , pp. 473 - 480
Copyright
Copyright © World Association for Disaster and Emergency Medicine 2012

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Simon, R, Teperman, S. The World Trade Center attack. Lessons for disaster management. Crit Care. 2001;5(6):318-320.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
2. Lockey, DJ, Mackenzie, R, Redhead, J, et al. London bombings July 2005: the immediate pre-hospital medical response. Resuscitation. 2005;66(2):ix-xii.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
3. Gómez, AM, Domínguez, CJ, Pedrueza, CI, et al. Management and analysis of out-of-hospital health-related responses to simultaneous railway explosions in Madrid, Spain. Eur J Emerg Med. 2007;14(5):247-255.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
4. Global Observatory for eHealth. mHealth: New Horizons for Health Through Mobile Technologies. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization; 2011.Google Scholar
5. Kindsmüller, M, Mentler, T, Herczeg, M, et al. Care & Prepare–Usability Engineering for Mass Casualty Incidents. ACM EICS4Med 2011: Proceedings of the 1st International Workshop on Engineering Interactive Computing Systems for Medicine and Health Care. 2011:30-35.Google Scholar
6. Lenert, LA, Chan, TC, Kirsh, D, et al. Wireless Internet Information System for Medical Response in Disasters ( WIISARD ) Final Report. http://collab.nlm.nih.gov/webcastsandvideos/siirsv/ucsdsummaryreport.pdf. Published 2008. Accessed July 2, 2011.Google Scholar
7. Meade, K, Lam, DM. A deployable telemedicine capability in support of humanitarian operations. Telemed J E Health. 2007;13(3):331-340.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
8. Levy, G, Blumberg, N, Kreiss, Y, et al. Application of information technology within a field hospital deployment following the January 2010 Haiti earthquake disaster. J Am Med Inform Assoc. 2010;17(6):626-630.Google ScholarPubMed
9. Nestler, S, Artinger, E, Coskun, T, et al. RFID based patient registration in mass casualty incidents. http://www.fg-mocomed.gi-ev.de/fileadmin/gliederungen/fg-mocomed/Paper_Mocomed2010/Mocomed_2010_Simon_Nestler_RFID_based_Patient_Registration_in_Mass_Casualty_Incidents.pdf. Accessed July 5, 2011.Google Scholar
10. Inoue, S, Sonoda, A, Oka, K, et al. Triage with RFID Tags. 2006 Pervasive Health Conference and Workshops. 2006:1-7.Google Scholar
11. White, D. Advanced Health and Disaster Aid Network Final Report. http://www.jhuapl.edu/AID-N/Pub/AID-N_Final_Report_v_0_7__091807.pdf. Accessed July 2, 2011.Google Scholar
12. Zhao, X, Rafiq, A, Hummel, R, et al. Integration of information technology, wireless networks, and personal digital assistants for triage and casualty. Telemed J E Health. 2006;12(4):466-474.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
13. Nakajima, I. Japanese telemedical concept of ambulatory application. J Med Syst. 2011;35(2):215-220.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
14. Maglogiannis, I, Hadjiefthymiades, S. EmerLoc: location-based services for emergency medical incidents. Int J Med Inform. 2007;76(10):747-759.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
15. Curtis, DW, Pino, EJ, Bailey, JM, et al. SMART--an integrated wireless system for monitoring unattended patients. J Am Med Inform Assoc. 2008;15(1):44-53.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
16. Abuan, LA. Information Sharing for Medical Triage Tasking During Mass Casualty/Humanitarian Operations [thesis]. Monterey, California USA: Naval Postgraduate School; 2009.Google Scholar
17. Chu, Y, Ganz, A. WISTA: A wireless telemedicine system for disaster patient care. Mobile Networks and Applications. 2007;12(2-3):201-214.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
18. Chang, C-S, Tan, T-H, Chen, Y-F, et al. Development of a ubiquitous emergency medical service system based on Zigbee and 3.5 G wireless communication technologies. In: Zhang D, Sonka M (eds), Medical Biometrics. Berlin/Heidelberg: Springer; 2010:201-208.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
19. Kang, J, Shin, IH, Koo, Y, et al. HSDPA (3.5G)-based ubiquitous integrated biotelemetry system for emergency care. Conf Proc IEEE Eng Med Biol Soc. 2007:3665-3668.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
20. Wouhaybi, RH, Yarvis, MD, Muse, P, et al. A context-management framework for telemedicine: an emergency medicine case study. Wireless Health 2010. 2010:164-173.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
21. Blaivas, M, Adhikari, S, Shiver, S, et al. Transfer of real-time ultrasound video of FAST examinations from victims at a disaster scene via a commercially available video cell phone. Ann Emerg Med. 2008;52(4):S126-S127.Google Scholar
22. Ganapathy, P, Joshi, SH, Yadegar, J, et al. An intelligent and portable ambulatory medical toolkit for automatic detection and assessment of traumatic brain injuries. Wireless Health 2010. 2010:24-33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
23. Salo, S, Salo, H, Liisanantti, A, et al. Data transmission in dental identification of mass disaster victims. J Forensic Odontostomatol. 2007;25(1):17-22.Google ScholarPubMed
24. Niyato, D, Hossain, E, Diamond, J. IEEE 802.16/WiMAX-based broadband wireless access and its application for telemedicine/e-health services. IEEE Wireless Communications. 2007;14(1):72-83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
25. Padmanabhan, N, Burstein, F, Churilov, L, et al. A mobile emergency triage decision support system evaluation. Proceedings of the 39th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS'06). 2006:96b.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
26. Schell, CL, Wohl, R, Rathe, R, et al. Automated vs manual triage for bioterrorist disaster: a blinded crossover feasibility study comparing personal digital assistant to paper-based triage. Am J Emerg Med. 2006;24(7):843-846.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
27. Sufi, F, Fang, Q, Cosic, I. A mobile phone based intelligent scoring approach for assessment of critical illness. 2008 International Conference on Technology and Applications in Biomedicine. 2008:290-293.Google Scholar
28. Swain, C. WISER and REMM: resources for disaster response. Journal of Electronic Resources in Medical Libraries. 2009;6(3):253-259.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
29. Williamson, HM. Disaster management mobile protocols: a technology that will save lives. Am J Disaster Med. 2011;6(1):55-64.Google ScholarPubMed
30. Jokela, J. The Use of Novel Information Technology in Military Medicine and Mass Casualty Situation Training [dissertation]. Tampere, Finland: University of Tampere; 2010.Google Scholar
31. Sufi, F, Khalil, I, Cosic, I. A mobile web grid based physiological signal monitoring system. 2008 International Conference on Technology and Applications in Biomedicine. 2008:252-255.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
32. Walderhaug, S, Meland, PH, Mikalsen, M, et al. Evacuation support system for improved medical documentation and information flow in the field. Int J Med Inform. 2008;77(2):137-151.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
33. Belala, Y, Issa, O, Gregoire, J-C, et al. A secure mobile multimedia system to assist emergency response teams. Telemed J E Health. 2008;14(6):560-569.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
34. Ko, J, Musaˇloiu-Elefteri, R, Lim, JH, et al. MEDiSN. Proceedings of the 6th ACM conference on embedded network sensor systems - SenSys ’08. 2008:361.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
35. International Telecommunications Union: The World in 2010: ICT Facts and Figures. Geneva, Switzerland: International Telecommunications Union; 2010.Google Scholar