Ontology supported assistive communications in healthcare

Abstract

This article presents progress with a conceptual framework for providing interactive healthcare guidance to help Aboriginal and ethnic minority patients disadvantaged by inter-cultural biopsychosocial barriers present in medical consultations. Using computer ontology development and semantic Web principles, an assistive communications technology (ACT) concept is proposed for primary care consultation process that we have titled the Patient- Practitioner Interview Encounter (PPIE) in primary care. Activity is devoted to the development of Patient Practitioner Assistive Communications (PPAC) ontology for type 2 Diabetes, and we present a simple case study projection to show its application. In the PPAC ontology, concepts of type 2 diabetes will be mapped with Aboriginal English Home Talk through ontology relations and constraints. Aboriginal English PPIE pragmatics comprises a voluminous and multilevel combination of structured and unstructured data, and this is also mapped to the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) T2DM Guidelines for management of type 2 diabetes. In addition to patients and primary-care practitioners, eventual end-users may include allied health professionals, family, and other carers, qualified and ad hoc interpreters. The ultimate goal from the contribution of all participants is improved wellbeing outcomes for patients. A range of technologies augmenting communication with patients, mostly in conceptual or prototype trial form have been viewed as potential for alignment with our concept.