Biomedical subjects

Adolfo Muñoz

Publications and source records attributed to Adolfo Muñoz.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Proof-of-concept design and development of an EN13606-based electronic health care record service.

OBJECTIVE: The authors present an Electronic Healthcare Record (EHR) server, designed and developed as a proof of concept of the revised prEN13606:2005 European standard concerning EHR communications. METHODS: The development of the server includes five modules: the libraries for the management of the standard reference model, for the demographic package and for the data types; the permanent storage module, built on a relational database; two communication interfaces through which the clients can send information or make queries; the XML (eXtensible Markup Language) process module; and the tools for the validation of the extracts managed, implemented on a defined XML-Schema. RESULTS: The server was subjected to four phases of trials, the first three with ad hoc test data and processes to ensure that each of the modules complied with its specifications and that the interaction between them provided the expected functionalities. The fourth used real extracts generated by other research groups for the additional purpose of testing the validity of the standard in real-world scenarios. CONCLUSION: The acceptable performance of the server has made it possible to include it as a middleware service in a platform for the out-of-hospital follow-up and monitoring of patients with chronic heart disease which, at the present time, supports pilot projects and clinical trials for the evaluation of eHealth services.

Computer Systems↗

PubMed2002

Development of a computer-assisted high-throughput screening platform for anti-angiogenic testing.

Angiogenesis is widely accepted to play a central role in tumor growth and spreading. Therefore, anti-angiogenic agents appear as promising tools in cancer therapy, and great efforts have been devoted to their identification in recent years. Despite fast progress in this area, a quantitative and objective system for rapid anti-angiogenic testing is not currently available. In this work, we describe a new platform for the large-scale screening of agents with potential anti-angiogenic activity. This involved the miniaturization of an in vitro two-dimensional assay model of vascular morphogenesis to run in a high-density format (384- or 1536-well microplates) and the development of a specific digital image-analysis system for the automated and quantitative evaluation of biological activity. To test the efficacy and reproducibility of the platform, we used a wide variety of well-characterized angiogenesis inhibitors, including antibodies against components of the extracellular matrix, peptides, and chemicals. The system proved to be a reproducible, polyvalent, and powerful tool for massive screening of agents with potential application in cancer therapy. Ongoing developmental work, directed toward optimizing this system for use with a fully automated high-throughput screening platform, should accelerate research into the mechanisms of tumor angiogenesis and the development of drugs that target the essential tumor vasculature.

Automation↗

PubMed2002

Teleradiology from primary care: comparison of user activity in two different scenarios.

We recorded the activity over one year of users of two identical teleradiology systems installed at different primary care centres. In one centre, which generated 3711 cases, the process was conducted according to the decisions made by the general practitioner (GP); in the second, which generated 3786 cases, the radiologist at the referral hospital controlled the process. In a one-year study, the number of studies created, transmitted and interpreted per day was similar in the two scenarios (14.3 vs 14.6, respectively); however, there were considerable differences in the number of images (2.2 vs 1.8, respectively) and folder volume (19.2 vs 14.3 Mbyte, respectively) per study. Also, there were differences in the time taken to create the patient folders (4 min 35 s vs 2 min 55 s, respectively) and the time taken for the radiologist to diagnose a case (3 min 32 s vs 2 min 47 s, respectively), which may be important at high workloads. The radiologist-driven scenario included 64 rejected requests (1.6% of cases) and 280 studies in which additional images were required (7.4% of cases). Whenever it is possible to choose, the radiologist-driven scenario for teleradiology appears to be preferable. A prerequisite for successful teleradiology is the availability of appropriate bandwidth and operational protocols.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗