[Abstract for the TMCC Workshop 2000]

P. van Schaik, P. Barker, A. van Wersch, N. Kaur,
T. Ahmed and J. Hindmarsh.

Urinary incontinence affects a large proportion (up to 50%) of the female population. It is a condition with complex medical and psychological aspects. It appears that current methods of patient information provision and diagnosis are inadequate and inefficient - both for consultants and their patients. A prototype interactive multimedia system has been developed to address both these issues. The introductory section of the system explains patient users how to use it. When the user has completed this section, patient information is available to her under the following headings: anatomy, incontinence, diagnostic tests and treatment. In addition there is a section which asks the patient a set of six simple symptom-related questions plus one question on her quality of life. The questions are taken and adapted from the Symptom Severity Index (SSI) and the International Prostate Symptom Score (IPSS). Patient scores on the different questions are added up to produce on overall incontinence symptom score (ICS). This score is analogous to the IPSS for prostate problems in males and is to be used to make management and treatment decisions. The system has been developed using Microsoft's FrontPage authoring tool. It is mainly coded in HTML and includes the use of active server pages for maintaining a database that contains patients' ICS data. Initial evaluations of the system indicate the potential of multimedia both for patients and for consultants - and for other health care professionals. In this presentation we will outline the design of the system, illustrate its use and discuss future plans for the evaluation of the system.