Patient- and Caregiver- Centered Systems for Cardiac Tele- Rehabilitation

Context and Motivation Over the past few decades, mortality from Coronary Artery Disease (CAD) has decreased. However, about 470,000 recurrent myocardial infractions are reported in the US [1]. Cardiac rehabilitation and secondary prevention programs have been proven effective to minimize recurrence and risk of disease. Traditionally, these programs are delivered to patients in a hospital or community healthcare center. Some constraints such as geographical distance to healthcare center, lack of time and psychological barriers to change behavior lead to decline in motivation to pursue long-term rehabilitation programs [9]. The rapid and deep penetration of mobile technologies (such as smartphones, smartwatches and activity trackers) and its popularity among diverse groups of people (in terms of age, socio-economic status, education backgrounds etc.) provide a great opportunity to leverage these to address the barriers in traditional cardiac rehabilitation systems. My background and interest in mobile technologies motivated me to pursue research in the direction of telemonitoring. While telemonitoring and tele-rehabilitation solutions show immense potential as an effective approach to address such issues, studies show a gradual decline in interest and lack of motivation in patients over a period of time which ultimately results in lack of therapy adherence [2,8]. Adopting persuasive technology in tele-rehabilitation solutions can contribute to solve these issues. The overall objective of my PhD research is to define, design and develop a comprehensive tele-rehabilitation solution for cardiac patients. This patient-centered solution will be complemented with a user-centered caregiver dashboard application to facilitate the telemonitoring process.