Semi-Automated Intensive Care Treatment Support
The RWTH proposal package "Smart Life Support 2.0" for intelligent technical implementation of organ and vital functions in intensive care units is now being funded by the German Research Foundation, DFG for short, with a total of two million euros for three years. The Chair of Medical Information Technology, the Department of heart, Thorax, and Vascular Surgery, the Department of Anaesthesiology and Operative Intensive Care for Adults, the Department of Applied Medical Engineering, the Department of Control Engineering, and the Chair of Computer Science 11 are jointly pursuing the goal of developing processes and strategies for the model-based automatization of life-support systems.
"The course of disease among patient clientele that is getting older and older becomes more and more complex. Due to increasings costs and tense personnel situations, optimal, individual therapy for patients in intensive care units can be made possible, standardized, and optimized with the help of intelligent technical assistant systems," emphasizes Prof. Dr.med. Dr.-Ing. Steffen Leonhardt, Head of the Philips Chair of Medical Information Technology and Speaker of the Consortium.
Smart Life Support places a focus on improved support for cardiovascular and pulmonary diseases. According to the Federal Statistics Agency both of these organ systems are the leading cause of death. For example in 2007, 75 percent of the ten most common causes of death were cardiovascular and pulmonary diseases.
Model-based automatization is a way of mastering complexity. In contrast to systems in a vehicle, autmoatic medical technical assistance systems also have to consider the severe changes of a patient's own regulatory system in their body. As a result, suitable and specific patient models for different disorders will be developed in the next three years.