bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
A Web-based Tool for Patients Cohorts and Clinical Trials management
Authors: Fraccaro P.  , Giacomini Mauro
Published: February 2025

Clinical Trials (CTs) play an increasingly important role in modern medicine. Often these types of studies, especially in the final phases, require collaboration between several hospitals, laboratories and institutions in different places or countries. The solution proposed is a template which exploits the principles of Networked Clinical Research and the strengths of Clinical Data Management Systems (CDMSs) commonly used (Electronic Data Capture (EDC), Electronic Medical Record (EMR) and Electronic Health Record (EHR). Therefore, the basic structure is a highly normalized and standardized database which is managed by a web platform and, only by recording the required information and developing web pages starting from predefined templates, it is possible to carry out new projects. The result is a hybrid CDMS which preserves the flexibility and user autonomy of EDC systems; and contemporarily, permits the creation of patients cohorts, as in EMR and EHR systems, in which to realize simultaneously different multicentric CTs in several medical fields.
Reusable Data in Public Health Data-bases-Problems encountered in Danish Children's Database
Authors: Høstgaard Anna Marie  , Pape-Haugaard Louise
Published: February 2025

Denmark have unique health informatics databases e.g. “The Children's Database”, which since 2009 holds data on all Danish children from birth until 17 years of age. In the current set-up a number of potential sources of errors exist - both technical and human-which means that the data is flawed. This gives rise to erroneous statistics and makes the data unsuitable for research purposes. In order to make the data usable, it is necessary to develop new methods for validating the data generation process at the municipal/regional/national level. In the present ongoing research project, two research areas are combined: Public Health Informatics and Computer Science, and both ethnographic as well as system engineering research methods are used. The project is expected to generate new generic methods and knowledge about electronic data collection and transmission in different social contexts and by different social groups and thus to be of international importance, since this is sparsely documented in the Public Health Informatics perspective. This paper presents the preliminary results, which indicate that health information technology used ought to be subject for redesign, where a thorough insight into the work practices should be point of departure.
A ClaML-based Interface for the Import of Monohierarchical Classifications
Authors: Mn Ngouongo Sylvie  , Stausberg Jürgen
Published: February 2025

The relevance of controlled vocabularies in promoting the standardized representation and exchange of clinical data is no longer to be proved. As part of a national project we evaluated the integration of classifications and terminologies in metadata registries based on the standard ISO/IEC 11179 Information technology - Metadata Registries (MDR). To overcome integration and maintenance tasks of monohierarchical classifications in the MDR, and to provide an exchange format between classifications publishers and the MDR, we implemented an import interface based on the Classification Markup Language (ClaML). The implementation transforms classifications from ClaML into a MDR conform structure using the Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformation (XSLT). Several XSLT-scripts were linked and successively executed. The national obliged classifications ICD-10-GM and OPS could be hence imported into the MDR. Problems arose with different interpretations and extensions of ClaML by WHO and the national publisher. We therefore advocate a unique interpretation of ClaML as prerequisite for a general use of the ClaML import interface.
Safety of a Web-Based Insulin Titration System for Patients with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus – Pilot study
Authors: Simon A.C.R.  , Holleman F.  , Gude W.T.  , Hoekstra J.B.L.  , Peek N.
Published: February 2025

The treatment of type 2 diabetes patients with insulin requires active dose titration to obtain optimal glycemic control. We developed a web-based decision support system to guide patients in performing the titration task autonomously, at their homes. The system is based on a clinically validated algorithm. The aim of this study was to test the safety of the system in a pilot implementation in clinical practice. Patients were blinded from the advice given by the system and instead received insulin dosing advice given by caregivers. At the end of the pilot, advice of the system were evaluated on safety by an expert panel. In this pilot study six patients used the web-based system at their home. In total, 48 advice were logged in the system resulting in eighteen deviating systems dosing advice as compared to the advice of the caregiver. Evaluation of the eighteen deviating systems advice lead to the detection of one unsafe advice indicating a need to extend the algorithm with an additional safety decision rule.
Ontology Based Log Content Extraction Engine for a posteriori Security Control
Authors: Azkia Hanieh  , Cuppens-Boulahia Nora  , Cuppens Frédéric  , Coatrieux Gouenou
Published: February 2025

In a posteriori access control, users are accountable for actions they performed and must provide evidence, when required by some legal authorities for instance, to prove that these actions were legitimate. Generally, log files contain the needed data to achieve this goal. This logged data can be recorded in several formats; we consider here IHE-ATNA (Integrating the healthcare enterprise-Audit Trail and Node Authentication) as log format. The difficulty lies in extracting useful information regardless of the log format. A posteriori access control frameworks often include a log filtering engine that provides this extraction function. In this paper we define and enforce this function by building an IHE-ATNA based ontology model, which we query using SPARQL, and show how the a posteriori security controls are made effective and easier based on this function.
On the Support of Flexible Patient Privacy Policies in Social-Medical Discovery
Authors: Roitman Haggai  , Yogev Sivan  , Tsimerman Yevgenia  , Peres Yardena
Published: February 2025

Many new socially flavored medical services have recently emerged, utilizing the data openness and sharing through social channels. The adoption of such services by patients is still very limited, mainly due to privacy issues. Existing social-medical discovery services support only strict patient privacy policies and are not flexible enough to accommodate a wider range of privacy policy definitions. In this paper we present the IBM Medical Information and Care System (Medics) privacy-aware social-medical discovery solution that provides a highly flexible support for both fine-grained and dynamic patient privacy policies.
Economic Impact of a Nationwide Interoperable e-Health system Using the PENG Evaluation Tool
Authors: Parv L.  , Saluse J.  , Aaviksoo A.  , Tiik M.  , Sepper R.  , Ross P.
Published: February 2025

Objective: The aim of this paper is to evaluate the costs and benefits of the Estonian interoperable health information exchange system. In addition, a framework will be built for follow-up monitoring and analysis of a nationwide HIE system.
eHealth Education of Professionals in the Baltic Sea Area
Authors: Bygholm Ann  , Günther Julia  , Bertelsen Pernille  , Nøhr Christian
Published: February 2025

In this paper we present a study on the extent, level and content of e-Health in existing formal educational systems in Lithuania, Germany, Finland, Norway and Denmark with the objectives of identifying future educational needs within this area. The study was carried out as a desk-top study and took place within the context of the ICT for Health project. The results of the study on the one hand revealed a wide range of programs and courses that included e-Health, but on the other hand also showed that in the educations of health care professionals (physicians, nurses etc.) the integration of e-Health elements are often marginal or non-existing. Thus the study indicates that there is a need for a higher integration of e-Health in the education of health care professionals. We discuss what kind of knowledge of e-Health is needed and how it could or should be integrated in these educations. We argue that providing possibilities for applying and experimenting with e-Health system in a concrete and tangible manner is central in order to raise the acceptance and capabilities of health care professionals to use e-Health systems.
SIScaR-GPU: fast simulation and visualization of intraoperative scattered radiation to support radiation protection training
Authors: Wagner Markus  , Dresing Klaus  , Ludwig Wolfram  , Ahrens Christoph Alexander  , Bott Oliver J.
Published: February 2025

Scattered radiation caused by the intraoperative use of mobile image intensifier systems (referred to as “C-arms”) is the main source of radiation exposure for operating room personnel and surgeons. To keep this possibly harmful exposure at a minimum level, a deliberate use of radiation, knowledge about distribution of scattered radiation and appropriate behavior pattern are indispensable. Therefore in several countries knowledge concerning these aspects is taught in mandatory courses on radiation protection. Currently this teaching is typically based on non-interactive didactical methods (texts, pictures and videos). Because of the complexity of the knowledge field this restriction might lead to an insufficient understanding of the facts, an inappropriate behavior and therefore to an avoidable radiation exposure. This paper presents a new software module, which is able to simulate and visualize intraoperative radiation distribution and the resulting dose values for the attending persons within a few seconds (less than 30s). The developed components, which simulate the radiation transport using a graphics processing unit three times faster than comparable approaches, were integrated exemplarily in the computer based C-arm training system virtX. This extended training system improves the teaching through a prompt visual feedback on non-trivial scattered radiation facts in freely adoptable situations.
Analog Real Time Learning Neural Network using Multiple and Sample Hold Circuits
Authors: Kawaguchi Masashi  , Jimbo Takashi  , Ishii Naohiro
Published: February 2025

In the neural network field, many application models have been proposed. A neuro chip and an artificial retina chip are developed to comprise the neural network model and simulate the biomedical vision system. Previous analog neural network models were composed of the operational amplifier and fixed resistance. It is difficult to change the connection coefficient. In this study, we used analog electronic multiple and sample hold circuits. The connecting weights describe the input voltage. It is easy to change the connection coefficient. This model works only on analog electronic circuits. It can finish the learning process in a very short time and this model will enable more flexible learning.
Evaluation of a Thermal-Comfort Control System Using Real Data
Authors: Bermejo Pablo  , Redondo Luis  , delaOssa Luis  , Rodríguez Daniel  , Flores M. Julia  , Urea Carmen  , Gámez José A.  , Martínez-Gómez Jesús  , Puerta José M.
Published: February 2025

There exist a wide number of works in the literature related to new systems devoted to manage thermal control in buildings. Commonly, their evaluation is performed by using simulation of users and environmental conditions. Thus, in this work we choose a successful thermal-comfort system, formerly evaluated with simulations, and evaluate it by using data from project ASHRAE RP-884, which provides logs of real data coming from different buildings, in a wide variety of climates, and occupied by people with different thermal preferences. From these logs, we propose a pre-processing and evaluation methodology in order to achieve more realistic evaluations.
Project-Based Learning with Small Serendipity for Multi-cultural Digital Archive
Authors: Miyachi Taizo  , Iga Saiko  , Furuhata Takashi  , Ogiue Atsushi
Published: February 2025

Project-Based Learning (PBL) is an instructional technique that emphasizes a collaborative combination between students, instructors and people in a real world, and student’s autonomous learning. We propose PBL with small serendipity that enables students to find a small serendipity from the combination of auto-flow of knowledge and annotation functions they made. Intermediate assess should be evaluated for wide range of ability of students in order to expand their ability. We also discuss the results of a pilot case of PBL with small serendipities in case of digital long rolled Picture Book“ehon” (connected a series of pictures).
On Input/Output Argumentation Frameworks
Authors: Baroni Pietro  , Boella Guido  , Cerutti Federico  , Giacomin Massimiliano  , Van Der Torre Leendert  , Villata Serena
Published: February 2025

This paper introduces Input/Output Argumentation Frameworks, a novel approach to characterize the behavior of an argumentation framework as a sort of black box exposing a well-defined external interface. As a starting point, we define the novel notion of semantics decomposability and analyze complete, stable, grounded and preferred semantics in this respect. Then we show as a main result that, under grounded, complete, stable and credulous preferred semantics, Input/Output Argumentation Frameworks with the same behavior can be interchanged without affecting the result of semantics evaluation of other arguments interacting with them.
Optimizing Nightly Schiphol Traffic through Time Based Operations
Authors: Nieuwenhuisen D.  , de Gelder N.
Published: February 2025

Under the umbrella of SESARs Atlantic Interoperability initiative to Reduce Emissions II (AIRE II) program, NLR, LVNL and KLM have teamed up to develop a novel arrival management system to improve nightly operations at Amsterdam Airport Schiphol using time-based operations. At night, aircraft often tend to arrive in bunches at the Amsterdam FIR, resulting in sequencing (e.g. vectoring) before TMA entrance. This disturbs their CDA and leads to inefficiency. This is not necessary as modern flight management systems are able to accurately predict their time of arrival. In addition many aircraft are able to share this information with the ground using data link. In this project, the partners have created a ground based planning system that interfaces with most aircraft via data-link. Aircraft down-link their ETA-threshold. These form the basis for an optimized planning that is aimed at preventing bunching in the FIR. To realize the planning, flight crews are requested to use their RTA functionality. The system has been tested in a live-trial for four consecutive nights. Bunching is significantly reduced and the amount of top-of-descent CDAs that can be flown is subsequently increased, resulting in less fuel burn and emissions.
Moonshine: employee-involved workplace innovation
Authors: van Horn Jennifer N.  , Santema Sicco C.
Published: February 2025

Moonshine is the practice of workplace innovation in which the end user plays a prominent role. The KLM Engineering & Maintenance moonshine program uses a prescriptive moonshine process model. This paper describes the development of a moonshine pro cess model from practitioners' literature. The model is tested in twenty-three cases of employee involved workplace innovation at KLM Engineering & Maintenance. We found additional activities used in practice, and found activities depicted in the model but not used in the cases. The iterative and recursive nature of moonshine was observed. Variables affecting moonshine were found in the case study, which are used for constructing a research question for future research into moonshine.
Exergaming for Elderly: Effects of Different Types of Game Feedback on Performance of a Balance Task
Authors: Lamoth Claudine J.C.  , Alingh Rolinde  , Caljouw Simone R.
Published: February 2025

Balance training to improve postural control in elderly can contribute to the prevention of falls. Video games that require body movements have the potential to improve balance. However, research about the effects of type of visual feedback (i.e. the exergame) on the quality of movement and experienced workout intensity is scarce. In this study twelve healthy older and younger subjects performed anterior-posterior or mediolateral oscillations on a wobble board, in three conditions: no feedback, real-time visual feedback, and real-time visual feedback with a competitive game element. The Elderly moved slower, less accurately and more irregularly than younger people. Both feedback conditions ensured a more controlled movement technique on the wobble-board and increased experienced workout intensity. The participants enjoyed the attention demanding competitive game element, but this game did not improve balance performance more than interacting with a game that incorporated visual feedback. These results show the potential of exergames with visual feedback to enhance postural control.
Modeling the Social Networking Experience Objectifying the Subjective
Authors: Cipresso Pietro  , Serino Silvia  , Gaggioli Andrea  , Riva Giuseppe
Published: February 2025

This study aimed at measuring objectively the experience of using social network sites (SNSs). At this aim, a model of experience has been defined, focusing on three main aspects of time-space continuum of individuals' states: physiological arousal, emotional valence, and attentional resources. At this purpose we developed a new approach to assess such an experience. The main idea is to consider arousal, valence and attention to track the users' experience collecting psychophysiological indexes at predefined period (for example each 10 seconds) to build an empirical model based on these data. Once we got the empirical curve we can fit these data using mathematical models.
On The Comparison of VR-Responses, as Performance Measures in Prospective Memory, with Auditory P300 Responses in MCI Detection
Authors: Tarnanas Ioannis  , Laskaris Nikos  , Tsolaki Magda
Published: February 2025

Patients with amnestic mild cognitive impairment are at high risk for developing Alzheimer's disease. Besides episodic memory dysfunction they show deficits in accessing contextual knowledge that further specifies a general spatial navigation task or an executive function (EF) virtual action planning. There has been only one previous work with virtual reality and the use of a virtual action planning supermarket for the diagnosis of mild cognitive impairment. The authors of that study examined the feasibility and the validity of the virtual action planning supermarket (VAP-S) for the diagnosis of patients with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and found that the VAP-S is a viable tool to assess EF deficits. In our study we employed the in-house platform of virtual action planning museum (VAP-M) and a sample of 25 MCI and 25 controls, in order to investigate deficits in spatial navigation, prospective memory and executive function. In addition, we used the morphology of late components in event-related potential (ERP) responses, as a marker for cognitive dysfunction. The related measurements were fed to a common classification scheme facilitating the direct comparison of both approaches. Our results indicate that both the VAP-M and ERP averages were able to differentiate between healthy elders and patients with amnestic mild cognitive impairment and agree with the findings of the virtual action planning supermarket (VAP-S). The sensitivity (specificity) was 100% (98%) for the VAP-M data and 87%(90%) for the ERP responses. Considering that ERPs have proven to advance the early detection and diagnosis of “presymptomatic AD”, the suggested VAP-M platform appears as an appealing alternative.
A System for Automatic Detection of Momentary Stress in Naturalistic Settings
Authors: Gaggioli Andrea  , Pioggia Giovanni  , Tartarisco Gennaro  , Baldus Giovanni  , Ferro Marcello  , Cipresso Pietro  , Serino Silvia  , Popleteev Andrei  , Gabrielli Silvia  , Maimone Rosa  , Riva Giuseppe
Published: February 2025

Prolonged exposure to stressful environments can lead to serious health problems. Therefore, measuring stress in daily life situations through non-invasive procedures has become a significant research challenge. In this paper, we describe a system for the automatic detection of momentary stress from behavioral and physiological measures collected through wearable sensors. The system's architecture consists of two key components: a) a mobile acquisition module; b) an analysis and decision module. The mobile acquisition module is a smartphone application coupled with a newly developed sensor platform (Personal Biomonitoring System, PBS). The PBS acquires behavioral (motion activity, posture) and physiological (hearth rate) variables, performs low-level, real-time signal preprocessing, and wirelessly communicates with the smartphone application, which in turn connects to a remote server for further signal processing and storage. The decision module is realized on a knowledge basis, using neural network and fuzzy logic algorithms able to combine as input the physiological and behavioral features extracted by the PBS and to classify the level of stress, after previous knowledge acquired during a training phase. The training is based on labeling of physiological and behavioral data through self-reports of stress collected via the smartphone application. After training, the smartphone application can be configured to poll the stress analysis report at fixed time steps or at the request of the user. Preliminary testing of the system is ongoing.
Immersive Virtual Environment for Visuo-Vestibular Therapy: Preliminary Results
Authors: Gascuel J.D.  , Payno H.  , Schmerber S.  , Martin O.
Published: February 2025

The sense of equilibrium aggregates several interacting cues. On vestibular areflexic patients, vision plays a major role. We developed an immersive therapeutic platform, based on 3D opto-kinetic stimulation that enables to tune the difficulty of the balance task by managing the type of optic flow and its speed. The balance adjustments are recorded by a force plate, quantified by the length of the center of pressure trajectory and detection of disequilibrium corrections (leans, compensation step). Preliminary analysis shows that (i) patients report a strong immersion feeling in the motion flow, triggering intense motor response to “fight against fall”; (ii) the ANOVA factorial design shows a significant effect of flow speed, session number and gaze anchor impact. In conclusion, this study shows that 3D immersive stimulation removes essential limits of traditional opto-kinetic stimulators (limited 2D motions and remaining fixed background cues). Moreover, the immersive optic flow stimulation is an efficient tool to induce balance adaptive reactions in vestibular patients. Hence, such a platform appears to be a powerful therapeutic tool for training and relearning of balance control processes.
PHIT for Duty, a Mobile Approach for Psychological Health Intervention
Authors: Kizakevich Paul N.  , Hubal Robert  , Brown Janice  , Lyden Jennifer  , Spira James  , Eckhoff Randall  , Zhang Yuying  , Bryant Stephanie  , Munoz Gilberto
Published: February 2025

The goal of this effort is to support prevention of psychological health problems through innovation in mobile personal health assessment and self-help intervention (SHI). For the U.S. military, we are developing and evaluating a field-deployable personalized application, PHIT for DutyTM, to help build resilience in healthy troops and support prevention in high-risk personnel. PHIT for Duty is delivered using any smartphone or tablet with optional nonintrusive physiological and behavioral sensors for health status monitoring. The application integrates a suite of health assessments with an intelligent advisor that recommends, tailors, and presents self-help advisories. PHIT for Duty is intended for secondary prevention of psychological health problems in persons who have been exposed to psychological trauma and may be showing some symptoms of distress, but have not been diagnosed with any psychological disease or disorder.
Use of a Virtual Integrated Environment in Prosthetic Limb Development and Phantom Limb Pain
Authors: Alphonso Aimee L.  , Monson Brett T.  , Zeher Michael J.  , Armiger Robert S.  , Weeks Sharon R.  , Burck J.M.  , Moran C.  , Davoodie R.  , Loeb G.  , Pasquina Paul F.  , Tsao Jack W.
Published: February 2025

Patients face two major difficulties following limb loss: phantom limb pain (PLP) in the residual limb and limited functionality in the prosthetic limb. Many studies have focused on decreasing PLP with mirror therapy, yet few have examined the same visual ameliorating effect with a virtual or prosthetic limb. Our study addresses the following key questions: (1) does PLP decrease through observation of a 3D limb in a virtual integration environment (VIE) and (2) can consistent surface electromyography (sEMG) signals from the VIE drive an advanced modular prosthetic limb (MPL)? Recorded signals from the residual limb were correlated to the desired motion of the phantom limb, and changes in PLP were scored during each VIE session. Preliminary results show an overall reduction in PLP and a trend toward improvement in signal-to-motion accuracy over time. These signals allowed MPL users to perform a wide range of hand motions.
Associations Between Facial Emotion Recognition, Cognition and Alexithymia in Patients with Schizophrenia: Comparison of Photographic and Virtual Reality Presentations
Authors: Gutiérrez-Maldonado J.  , Rus-Calafell M.  , Márquez-Rejón S.  , Ribas-Sabaté J.
Published: February 2025

Emotion recognition is known to be impaired in schizophrenia patients. Although cognitive deficits and symptomatology have been associated with this impairment there are other patient characteristics, such as alexithymia, which have not been widely explored. Emotion recognition is normally assessed by means of photographs, although they do not reproduce the dynamism of human expressions. Our group has designed and validated a virtual reality (VR) task to assess and subsequently train schizophrenia patients. The present study uses this VR task to evaluate the impaired recognition of facial affect in patients with schizophrenia and to examine its association with cognitive deficit and the patients' inability to express feelings. Thirty clinically stabilized outpatients with a well-established diagnosis of schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder were assessed in neuropsychological, symptomatic and affective domains. They then performed the facial emotion recognition task. Statistical analyses revealed no significant differences between the two presentation conditions (photographs and VR) in terms of overall errors made. However, anger and fear were easier to recognize in VR than in photographs. Moreover, strong correlations were found between psychopathology and the errors made.
Two Approaches to Programs Synthesis or Implementation of Partially Defined Theories
Authors: Malyshkin Victor
Published: February 2025

Logic programming approach demonstrated technological not implementability of the program realization of an axiomatic theory. Here it is suggested to describe the axiomatic theory partially, in order to overcome the problem of the not implementability. Partially defined axiomatic theory should contain not all the possible decisions/theorems/, but those only, that were already well implemented once.
How Does the Choice of Morphological Analyser Influence the Quality of Syntactical Analysis?
Authors: Puolakainen Tiina
Published: February 2025

The usual steps of computational analysis of a text include morphological analysis, morphological disambiguation and (shallow) syntactic analysis; often these steps are carried out in linear order and each step of automatic analysis uses the output of previous step as an input. So, the quality of each step depends on the quality of the previous steps. Our article is concerned with the impact of the first aforementioned step – the morphological analysis – on the (shallow) syntactic analysis. The analyzed language is Estonian – a language characterized by rich morphology and relatively free word order.
Ontological Features of Entities in Motion Events and Their Role in the Semantic Analysis of Sentences
Authors: Õim Haldur
Published: February 2025

In the paper a model of semantic representation of sentences/texts that describe motion events is outlined. The task is to build a model that takes into account the ontological features of the entities involved.
Automated NFC Enabled Rural Healthcare for Reliable Patient Record Maintainance
Authors: Sethia Divyashikha  , Jain Shantanu  , Kakkar Himadri
Published: February 2025

Body sensor networks can be used for health monitoring of patients by expert medical doctors, in remote locations like rural areas in developing countries, and can also be used to provide medical aid to areas affected by natural disasters in any part of the world. An important issue to be addressed, when the number of patients is large, is to reliably maintain the patient records and have simple automated mobile applications for healthcare helpers to use. We propose an automated healthcare architecture using NFC-enabled mobile phones and patients having their patient ID on RFID tags. It utilizes NFC-enabled mobile phones to read the patient ID, followed by automated gathering of healthcare vital parameters from body sensors using Bluetooth, analyses the information and transmits it to a medical server for expert feedback. With limited hospital resources and less training requirement for healthcare helpers through simpler applications, this automation of healthcare processing can provide time effective and reliable mass health consultation from medical experts in remote locations.
Handling Server-Side Software Versioning: the “Smart Technology” Approach
Authors: Ivanovs Juris  , Rauhvargers Krišs
Published: February 2025

Deploying new versions of server-side software is similar to deploying new versions of desktop software, however it is considered more complex and time consuming. Therefore, if new versions are released frequently and they need to be deployed to many servers, doing the work manually may lead to several problems — errors due to incorrect deployments, misconfigurations and considerable amount of time spent on routine tasks. This paper is a study of methods used for desktop software versioning in order to apply them to server-side software needs. The main focus was set on server-side software that is based on PHP and Oracle technology, however solutions where sought that could be used for other serverside technologies as well, e.g., ASP.NET, Java and Ruby. As a result, a solution was created and applied in a real-world scenario that helps handling server-side software versioning by automating builds of new versions, deployment and validation processes.
Discussion Session 4.1: Embankments and dams
Authors: Dounias G.
Published: February 2025

Some of the challenges concerning embankments and dams are mentioned, such as safety, increasing dimensions and usage of marginal and new materials. The articles of the session are grouped into five themes. Basic points of the papers are mentioned and some comments and questions are posed in order to facilitate discussion.
Instability phenomena in hard soils-weak rocks: Importance of the anisotropy
Authors: Simic Davor
Published: February 2025

Hard soils and weak rocks constitute a borderline material group where, in many instances, it is difficult to apply properly behaviour models either from pure soil or rock mechanics. This situation becomes more evident in slope stability analyses where the usual geotechnical models for soil (for example, slices method) or rocks (for example, wedge analysis) tend to underpredict the factor of safety, leading to a design of the slope on the unsafe side. This panel ilustrates this fact by means of two examples, taken each one from the hard soil and the other from the weak rock case. The cases shown indicate the important role of the strength anisotropy of the material in the triggering of the failure.
Experiences with the application of Eurocode 7
Authors: Orr T.L.L.
Published: February 2025

Following the implementation in 2010 of Eurocodes 7 and 8 for geotechnical and seismic design in many European countries, a series of Workshops was held as part of the XV ECSMGE in Athens to share experiences with the application of these Eurocodes. The Workshop presentations that focused on Eurocode 7 are summarized in this report. These presentations showed the different ways in which Eurocode 7 is being implemented in ten countries, not only with different Design Approaches but also with other differences, such as the introduction of safety classes, and with many countries producing additional rules in the form of non-conflicting complement information. The presentations on pile design to Eurocode 7 revealed that, in addition to different Design Approaches, many differences still remain in the way pile resistances are determined and many countries have introduced model factors for pile design. The challenges in using numerical methods for Eurocode 7 designs were examined and future developments of Eurocode 7 were discussed.
Clinician Variations in Data Trust and Use
Authors: Courtney Karen L.  , Jiang Yun  , Beach Scott R.  , Matthews Judith T.  , Schulz Richard
Published: February 2025

This study examined how variations in the source and type of patient health data affected health care providers' perceptions of the trustworthiness and usefulness of the data. Overall, respondents (n=107) reported moderate to high levels of trust and usefulness of health status data from all sources. Technology sources were rated as more trustworthy than traditional, non-technology sources (paired t=−2.84, p<0.006). However, there was no significant difference between technology sources and non-technology sources (paired t=−1.63, p<0.108) in perceived usefulness for clinical decision making.
Benefits of a Clinical Planning and Coordination Module: A Simulation Study
Authors: Jensen Sanne  , Vingtoft Søren  , Nøhr Christian
Published: February 2025

Digital Clinical Practice Guidelines are commonly used in Danish health care. Planning and decision support are particularly important to patients with chronic diseases, who often are in contact with General Practitioners, Community Nurses and hospitals. In the Capital Region of Denmark the potential benefits of a planning and coordination module has been assessed in a full-scale simulation test including 18 health care professionals. The results showed that health care professionals can benefit from such a module. Furthermore unexpected new possible benefits concerning communication and quality management emerged during the test and potential new groups of users were identified.
POND4Kids: A Global Web-based Database for Pediatric Hematology and Oncology Outcome Evaluation and Collaboration
Authors: Quintana Yuri  , Patel Aman N.  , Arreola Magada  , Antillon Federico G.  , Ribeiro Raul C.  , Howard Scott C.
Published: February 2025

The Pediatric Oncology Network Database, (www.pond4kids.org, POND), is a secure, web-based, multilingual pediatric hematology/oncology database created for use in countries with limited resources to meet various clinical data management needs including cancer registration, delivery of protocol-based care, outcome evaluation, and assessment of psychosocial support programs. Established as a part of the International Outreach Program at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, POND serves as a tool for oncology units to store patient data for easy retrieval and analysis and to achieve uniform data collection to facilitate meaningful comparison of information among centers. Launched in 2003, POND now has 233 sites registered with over 1,000 users in 66 countries. However, adoption and usage of POND varies widely among sites. This paper reviews some of the challenges to developing a global collaborative clinical platform based on the experiences of developing POND. The paper also presents a case study of POND use in Guatemala, where the Guatemalan National Oncology Unit (UNOP) has developed extensive internal and external global collaborations using POND.
Islamic E-Health: Definitions, Applications and Challenges
Authors: Househ Mowafa
Published: February 2025

The purpose of this exploratory study is to introduce the concept of Islamic E-health. The study defines Islamic E-health and discusses various applications of this concept. Data collection methods used for the study included interviews, Facebook, Google, and iTunes searches using a variety of Islamic E-health-related terms. The results show that some Islamic E-health applications focus primarily on spiritual health, followed by Hajj systems for surveillance and monitoring and the use of electronic medical records to monitor the blood glucose levels of Muslim patients who fast during the month of Ramadan. Future research and research limitations are also discussed.
Empowering Saudi Patients: How do Saudi Health Websites Compare to International Health Websites?
Authors: Househ Mowafa  , Alsughayar Abdulrahman  , Al-Mutairi Maha
Published: February 2025

Little information is known about how Saudi health websites compare internationally. The purpose of this paper is to compare two leading Saudi health websites with leading international health websites. The study was conducted as a convenience sample at a graduate health college in Saudi Arabia. A total of 42 students participated in the study. The study found that, in general, English websites have higher levels of performance with regard to quality of information, authority and objectivity, coverage and currency, and design. However, the respondents considered Saudi health websites to be superior with regard to maintaining privacy and security. The results indicate that much more work is needed in designing Saudi Health to make them more trustworthy and credible. The limitations of this work and future research directions are also discussed.
Challenges in data quality assurance for electronic health records
Authors: Shabestari Omid  , Roudsari Abdul
Published: February 2025

Data quality is an integral part of EHR systems. Quality assurance for these systems not only identifies the current defects in the data but also aims for minimizing the risk of their future occurrence. Previous studies for secondary use of data in research projects presented several dimensions for such defects and proposed few methods for identifying them. Although those methods were successful in small scale research studies, their application to large scale day-to-day flow of information in EHR systems involves many challenges. In this paper, we highlighted those challenges for each method and each dimension and proposed a framework for using existing technologies to address those challenges.
Telecardiology on Vancouver Island: Imagination to Implementation
Authors: Horwood Trent  , Aylott Mya  , Loyola Margarita  , Henderson Jill  , Frank Gary  , Fyfe Mary Lyn
Published: February 2025

In 2011, there were more than 97,000 people living with Heart Failure in British Columbia (BC) with a total of 17,592 within VIHA. To increase patient accessibility to specialist care, the Vancouver Island Health Authority (VIHA) implemented a telecardiology program that utilizes digital stethoscopes, telehealth technology and collaboration to deliver cardiac care remotely. The program has successfully completed 20 consultations to date in 6 communities within the VIHA. This article outlines processes and outcomes of enabling the existing VIHA cardiology program with the use of telehealth technologies.
A “Realist Review” Approach to e-Health: The Case of Type 2 Diabetes in Youth
Authors: Hebert Marilynne A.
Published: February 2025

As e-health technology becomes more ubiquitous in our health and health care environments, a flexible, robust understanding of what works and under what circumstances is needed. Traditional meta-analyses tell us how frequently a technology has worked for previous populations, but not why. Realist Reviews can contribute to understanding why interventions work and by extension how results of past studies can be applied to emerging health challenges. The utility of such a method is considered in e-health interventions to address the serious growing challenge of Type 2 diabetes and metabolic syndrome in young people.
The Development of a Standardized Software Platform to Support Provincial Population-Based Cancer Outcomes Units for Multiple Tumour Sites: OaSIS - Outcomes and Surveillance Integration System
Authors: Wu Jonn  , Ho Cheryl  , Laskin Janessa  , Gavin David  , Mak Paul  , Duncan Keith  , French John  , McGahan Colleen  , Reid Sherry  , Chia Stephen  , Cheung Heidi
Published: February 2025

Understanding the impact of treatment policies on patient outcomes is essential in improving all aspects of patient care. The BC Cancer Agency is a provincial program that provides cancer care on a population basis for 4.5 million residents. The Lung and Head & Neck Tumour Groups planned to create a generic yet comprehensive software infrastructure that could be used by all Tumour Groups: the Outcomes and Surveillance Integration System (OaSIS). The primary goal was the development of an integrated database that will amalgamate existing provincial data warehouses of varying datasets and provide the infrastructure to support additional routes of data entry, including clinicians from multiple-disciplines, quality of life and survivorship data from patients, and three dimensional dosimetric information archived from the radiotherapy planning and delivery systems. The primary goal is to be able to capture any data point related to patient characteristics, disease factors, treatment details and survivorship, from the point of diagnosis onwards. Through existing and novel data-mining techniques, OaSIS will support unique population based research activities by promoting collaborative interactions between the research centre, clinical activities at the cancer treatment centres and other institutions. This will also facilitate initiatives to improve patient outcomes, decision support in achieving operational efficiencies and an environment that supports knowledge generation.
Surgical Novices Randomized to Train in Two Video Games Become More Motivated During Training in MIST-VR and GI Mentor II Than Students with No Video Game Training
Authors: Hedman Leif  , Schlickum Marcus  , Felländer-Tsai Li
Published: February 2025

We investigated if engagement modes and perceived self-efficacy differed in surgical novices before and after randomized training in two different video games during five weeks, and a control group with no training. The control group expressed to a higher extent negative engagement modes during training in MIST-VR and GI Mentor II than the experimental groups. No statistically significant differences in self-efficacy were identified between groups. Both engagement modes and self-efficacy showed a positive correlation with previous and present video game experience. It is suggested that videogame training could have a framing effect on surgical simulator performance. EM and SE might be important intermediate variables between the strength of relationship between current videogame experience and simulator performance.
A Directed Particle System for Optimised Visualization of Blood Flow in Complex Networks
Authors: Pop Serban R.  , Hughes Chris J.  , Ap Cenydd Llyr  , John Nigel W.
Published: February 2025

This paper introduces a novel technique for the visualization of blood (or other fluid) flowing through a complex 3D network of vessels. The Directed Particle System (DPS) approach is loosely based on the computer graphics concept of flocking agents. It has been developed and optimised to provide effective real time visualization and qualitative simulation of fluid flow. There are many potential applications of DPS, and one example – a decision support tool for coronary collateralization – is discussed.
Requirements Analysis of a 5 Degree of Freedom Haptic Simulator for Orthopedic Trauma Surgery
Authors: Barrow Alastair  , Akhtar Kash  , Gupte Chinmay  , Bello Fernando
Published: February 2025

There are currently few Virtual Reality simulators for orthopedic trauma surgery. The current simulators provide only a basic recreation of the manual skills involved, focusing instead on the procedural and anatomical knowledge required. One factor limiting simulation of the manual skills is the complexity of adding realistic haptic feedback, particularly torques. This paper investigates the requirements, in terms of forces and workspace (linear and rotational), of a haptic interface to simulate placement of a lag screw in the femoral head, such as for fixation of a fracture in the neck of the femur. To measure these requirements, a study has been conducted involving 5 subjects with experience performing this particular procedure. The results gathered are being used to inform the design of a new haptic simulator for orthopedic trauma surgery.
Laparoscopic Surgery Simulator Using First Person View and Guidance Force
Authors: Tagawa Kazuyoshi  , Tanaka Hiromi T.  , Kurumi Yoshimasa  , Komori Masaru  , Morikawa Shigehiro
Published: February 2025

In general, minimally invasive surgery is seen as the most difficult surgery because there is limited field of view with an endoscope and force sensation from surgical instruments such as forceps is poor. Especially in early clinical education for medical students, a virtual reality surgical simulator would be an effective tool. In this paper, we propose a visuohaptic surgery training system for laparoscopical techniques. We recorded a video from a first person point of view of the instructor (expert). And we also recorded operation information (i.e. trajectory) of surgical instruments of the instructor. Then, we displayed the recorded video and the guidance force to trainees. We constructed a prototype surgery training system and the effectiveness of our approach was confirmed.
Use of Simulation to Understand the Effects of Task Complexity and Time Away on Clinical Confidence
Authors: Cohen Elaine  , Ononye Chiagozie  , Salud Jonathan  , Kwan Calvin  , Salud Lawrence  , Pugh Carla
Published: February 2025

In prior studies, mannequin-based simulation training has been used to help decrease student anxiety toward intimate clinical examinations. Using time away as an independent variable, the aim of this study was to assess decay of clinical confidence for four procedural tasks that vary in procedural complexity. Clinical confidence with intimate examinations, after a standardized mannequin-based simulation curriculum, decays over time. This decay is noted after two months of time away. Longer periods of time away did not show increased differences.
Physics and Engineering Aspects of Cell and Tissue Imaging Systems: Microscopic Devices and Computer Assisted Diagnosis
Authors: Chen Xiaodong  , Ren Liqiang  , Zheng Bin  , Liu Hong
Published: February 2025

The conventional optical microscopes have been used widely in scientific research and in clinical practice. The modern digital microscopic devices combine the power of optical imaging and computerized analysis, archiving and communication techniques. It has a great potential in pathological examinations for improving the efficiency and accuracy of clinical diagnosis. This chapter reviews the basic optical principles of conventional microscopes, fluorescence microscopes and electron microscopes. The recent developments and future clinical applications of advanced digital microscopic imaging methods and computer assisted diagnosis schemes are also discussed.