Furthermore, over the coming years, the internet will be more widely used in the home environment, through systems which can provide access on the television. Public multimedia kiosks will enable those who do not have access at home to benefit from information technology. Access to high quality information could allow patients to make informed decisions about their own health. As computer processing power continues to increase, computers will become ever more intelligent in the way they interact with humans. A great deal of research is taking place into software agents and interfaces.
Software agents allow computers to accomplish tasks on behalf of users in an intelligent way.
They are designed to work proactively, co-operating with other agents or individuals, and to learn in the process. Typically, an agent will manage one small task, for example, a user's diary, or communication to a user. Developers of agents are looking at a wide range of applications of this technology, and medicine is an area that may benefit in particular. A summarising agent then uses natural language processing to reduce this information to an appropriate level of detail. Finally, a presentation agent notifies and displays the information to the user, automatically gathering from the user information which will enable the agents to improve their performance.