Health Data Democratization in Austria: Patients' Perspective.

Health data democratization requires a transparent, protected, and interoperable data-sharing environment. We conducted a co-creation workshop with patients living with chronic diseases and relevant stakeholders to explore their opinion on health data democratization, ownership, and sharing in Austria. Participants showed their willingness to share their health data for clinical and research purposes; provided that appropriate transparency and data protection measures are provided.

General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Toolkit for Digital Health.

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) entered into force on May 25, 2018. Compliance with GDPR is especially relevant to the Digital Health (DH) domain, as it is common to process highly sensitive personal data regarding a person's health. However, GDPR compliance is a very challenging process since it requires implementing several technical and organizational measures to maintain compliance. With the aim to facilitate this process, we reviewed the published best practices in GDPR compliance. Then, we customized the findings to fit into the DH domain and created a toolkit for GDPR implementation and compliance. The Activity Planning Tool (APT) is provided as an example of how this toolkit could be utilized in new application development in mobile health in Austria. In the case of our APT, the toolkit was very helpful in integrating the GDPR technical requirements in addition to creating the corresponding compliance impact assessment, processing agreements, privacy policy, data flowcharts, and compliance checklists.

The Development of a Digital Tool for Planning Physical Exercise Training During Cardiac Rehabilitation.

In this work, we describe the conceptualization and development of a digital tool to support patients in adhering to prescription of physical exercise training during cardiac rehabilitation. To meet the need for an individual and trackable heart-healthy training plan - which became even more evident during the Coronavirus pandemic - the Activity Planning Tool was developed within a user-centered design process. Tackling the relationship between rehabilitation professional and patient, it allows to jointly set up, monitor, and regularly review a personalized physical activity plan.

Introducing patient and public involvement practices to healthcare research in Austria: strategies to promote change at multiple levels.

BACKGROUND: Patient and public involvement (PPI) in research is well-established in the UK. However, it can be challenging to introduce PPI to research communities where there is limited prior knowledge, experience or appreciation of PPI. We aimed to explore current PPI practices, experiences and ethical and operational challenges with PPI within our own research community in Austria, to inform strategies for supporting PPI in Austria going forward. METHODS: We surveyed scientists at 21 research institutes of the Ludwig Boltzmann Gesellschaft (LBG) and representatives of 32 medical and university research ethics committees in Austria using online questionnaires. We analysed quantitative data using descriptive statistics, and we collated textual responses to open questions. We combined survey data with anecdotal evidence from our personal experience to summarise current challenges around implementing PPI in Austria. RESULTS: Nineteen scientists from nine research institutes indicated generally positive attitudes towards PPI. However, the majority reported they rarely or never involved patients and members of the public in roles of consultation, collaboration or control in research. Six of eight ethics committees were unfamiliar with PPI. We discern five current challenges to implementing PPI in Austria: lack of knowledge and skills for PPI among scientists, scepticism about the usefulness of PPI, conflation of PPI with qualitative research, uncertainty about ethical requirements for PPI and uncertainty about publishing PPI activities. DISCUSSION: We suggest that the provision of guidance about ethical requirements of PPI is a strategic priority. To address this, and following on from a recently introduced PPI training and grant scheme by the LBG, our surveys have initiated a dialogue with ethics committees and have informed the development of a checklist for ethical aspects of PPI. CONCLUSION: Our experiences may provide useful examples to others who seek to introduce or strengthen PPI practices within their own research communities.

ICT Inexperienced Elderlies: What Would Attract Elderlies to Use Items of Technology?

This paper presents the findings of the first end-user research study with seniors who are not familiar with operating ICT devices, executed as part of the EU-Active and Assisted Living research project Kith & Kin. This project aims at developing an ICT device for these seniors by building on their needs and real capabilities, encouraging communication and fostering social inclusion.

Assistive Solutions in Practice: Experiences from AAL Pilot Regions in Austria.

Since 2012 six AAL pilot regions were launched in Austria. The main goal of these pilot regions is to evaluate the impact of AAL technologies in daily use considering the entire value chain. Additionally, go-to market strategies for assistive technologies based on an involvement of all relevant stakeholders are developed. Within this paper an overview of the specific objectives, approaches and the status of all Austrian AAL pilot regions is given. Taking into account the different experiences of the different pilot regions, specific challenges in establishing, implementing and sustaining pilot region projects are discussed and lessons-learned are presented. Results show that a careful planning of all project phases taking into account available resources is crucial for the successful implementation of an AAL pilot region. In particular, this applies to all activities related to the active involvement of end-users.