HOME PATIENT HOSPITAL CARE COMMUNICATION BRIDGE SYSTEM AND METHOD

The present invention is a data bridge system for coordinating digital data from multiple sources and delivering them on a single data server from a patient to a healthcare provider.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

DEFINITIONS

The term “comprising” is not intended to limit inventions to only claiming the present invention with such comprising language. Any invention using the term comprising could be separated into one or more claims using “consisting” or “consisting of” claim language and is so intended.

The drawings featured in the figures are for the purpose of illustrating certain convenient embodiments of the present invention, and are not to be considered as limitation thereto. Term “means” preceding a present participle of an operation indicates a desired function for which there is one or more embodiments, i.e., one or more methods, devices, or apparatuses for achieving the desired function and that one skilled in the art could select from these or their equivalent in view of the disclosure herein and use of the term “means” is not intended to be limiting.

As used herein the term “patient” refers to a human or non-human subject who is being treated monitored or the like for a medical condition, disease or the like by a healthcare professional. The patient will be in a home healthcare setting. As used herein the term “home healthcare setting” refers to any first location where the healthcare professional monitoring the patient is not. In general that can be the home of the patient, a nursing home, vacation location, automobile, ambulance or the like where the patient is being monitored or in connection with multiple digital data devices.

As used herein, the term “healthcare provider” refers preferably to the patient's physician, most often their primary care physician, but may also refer to any employee, affiliate, colleague or agent of the physician or the healthcare provider's organization. For example, if the patient belongs to a health maintenance organization (HMO) the healthcare provider may refer to any employee of the HMO, such as doctors, specialists, nurses, administrators, pharmacy personnel, lab technicians, etc. It could be at the physician's office the hospital in general, the insurance company and could also include information services such as admissions, the IT department, billing records, health education and human resources; or Therapeutic services such as PT or OT, speech, language, respiratory therapy, pharmacy, nursing, dietary; diagnostic services such as the med lab, radiology, nuclear medicine, the emergency room, cardiology, neurology or the support services such as central supply, biomedical, housekeeping, maintenance, dietary and transportation. The healthcare provider is at a separate location that is not where the patient is located.

As used herein the term “patient interface device” is a hub for pubbing or connecting the plurality of digital data healthcare information devices into which can take each of the data streams for the devices and send them in a single stream while keeping the data individualized for later. The device hub will connect to a data transfer system to be able to send the single stream to the desired location a data center server.

As used herein the “data transfer system” is a system for transmitting digital information from one location to another. The internet, telephones and cell phones are practical examples but any system which moves the data is acceptable.

As used herein the term “digital data healthcare information device” refers to electronic devices used in the field of healthcare designed for monitoring one or more facets of a patient. The industry for so called remote healthcare devices is growing rapidly with many of the digital devices being wireless devices, or wired and including two way audio visual (a/v), respiratory, blood pressure, blood analysis, infusion control, ekg, temperature, fluid volume, cardio-diagnostics, blood and other chemistry assay protocol, blood glucose, vascular function, heart rate, lab on a chip implants and all digital physiological waveforms and measurements, also included are Doppler, thermal imaging, noncontact web assessments and the like. Digital signal may be of the type provided continuously, intermittently, as needed or at any desired fashion or interval, and the like.

As used herein, the term “Internet” refers to any collection of networks using standard protocols. For example, the term includes a collection of interconnected (public and/or private) networks that are linked together by a set of standard protocols (such as TCP/IP, HTTP, and FTP) to form a global, distributed network. While this term is intended to refer to what is now commonly known as the Internet, it is also intended to encompass variations that may be made in the future, including changes and additions to existing standard protocols or integration with other media (e.g., television, radio, etc). The term is also intended to encompass non-public networks such as private (e.g., corporate) Intranets. As used herein, the terms “World Wide Web” or “web” refer generally to both (i) a distributed collection of interlinked, user-viewable hypertext documents (commonly referred to as Web documents or Web pages) that are accessible via the Internet, and (ii) the client and server software components which provide user access to such documents using standardized Internet protocols. Currently, the primary standard protocol for allowing applications to locate and acquire Web documents is HTTP, and the Web pages are encoded using HTML. However, the terms “Web” and “World Wide Web” are intended to encompass future markup languages and transport protocols that may be used in place of (or in addition to) HTML and HTTP.

As used herein the term “data center server” refers to a computer system, including traditional desktop computers, as well as other computing devices (e.g., calculators, phones, watches, personal digital assistants, etc.). In some embodiments, the computer system comprises computer memory or a computer memory device and a computer processor. In some embodiments, the computer memory (or computer memory device) and computer processor are part of the same computer. In other embodiments, the computer memory device or computer memory is located on one computer and the computer processor is located on a different computer. In some embodiments, the computer memory is connected to the computer processor through the Internet or World Wide Web. In some embodiments, the computer memory is on a computer readable medium (e.g., floppy disk, hard disk, compact disk, DND, etc). In other embodiments, the computer memory (or computer memory device) and computer processor are connected via a local network or intranet. In some embodiments, “a processor” may in fact comprise multiple processors in communication with each other for carrying out the various processing tasks required to reach the desired end result. For example, the computer of an intermediary service provider may perform some processing or information storage and the computer of a customer linked to the intermediary service provider may perform other processing or information storage.

As used herein, the term “computer readable medium” refers to any device or system for storing and providing information (e.g., data and instructions) to a computer processor. Examples of computer readable media include, but are not limited to, DNDs, CDs, hard disk drives, magnetic tape and servers for streaming media over networks. As used herein, the term “encode” refers to the process of converting one type of information or signal into a different type of information or signal to, for example, facilitate the transmission and/or interpretability of the information or signal. For example, image files can be converted into (i.e., encoded into) electrical or digital information. Likewise, light patterns can be converted into electrical or digital information that provides an encoded video capture of the light patterns.

The data center server takes the digital signals received from the plurality of data devices and combines and delivers the data to the healthcare provider for use on single or multiple devices using a process stored on computer readable medium. As used herein, the term “in electronic communication” refers to electrical devices (e.g., computers, processors, etc.) that are configured to communicate with one another through direct or indirect signaling. For example, a conference bridge that is connected to a processor through a cable or wire, such that information can pass between the conference bridge and the processor, are in electronic communication with one another. Likewise, a computer configured to transmit (e.g., through cables, wires, infrared signals, telephone lines, etc) information to another computer or device, is in electronic communication with the other computer or device. As used herein, the term “transmitting” refers to the movement of information (e.g. data) from one location to another (e.g., from one device to another) using any suitable means.

The healthcare provider then after receipt can view utilized communication or the like not having to have a separate device for each device for each patient. A single device at the healthcare provider can then receive the digital data from the data center server and display all the desired information even though multiple different patients with multiple different devices are involved.

Now referring to the drawings,FIG. 1is a relationship figure of the parts of the bridging system of the present invention. A patient in an in home setting,1has digital monitoring devices2, or two way real time a/v device3, or the like in communication between the patient1and an interface device4. The interface device combines the digital signals from the monitoring device2and the a/v device3and is in communication with one or more of the internet5or the phone system (including cell phones)6. The data center server7then sends the multiple streams to one or more healthcare providers such as insurance8the hospital/physician or anyone there9or some other10healthcare type provider.

InFIG. 2there is a flow chart of the present invention. The home patient signs into the patient interface21, then the interface establishes communication with the internet or phone digital connection to the data server22. The patient then can initiate communication of the monitoring/communicating devices with the data server23. The data server then combines all the data streams and delivers one stream to the healthcare provider at their location24.

Those skilled in the art to which the present invention pertains may make modifications resulting in other embodiments employing principles of the present invention without departing from its spirit or characteristics, particularly upon considering the foregoing teachings. Accordingly, the described embodiments are to be considered in all respects only as illustrative, and not restrictive, and the scope of the present invention is, therefore, indicated by the appended claims rather than by the foregoing description or drawings. Consequently, while the present invention has been described with reference to particular embodiments, modifications of structure, sequence, materials and the like apparent to those skilled in the art still fall within the scope of the invention as claimed by the applicant.