Design and evaluation of a web-based interactive visualization system for lung transplant home monitoring data

We describe the implementation and evaluation of an interactive system for displaying patient pulmonary information from a lung transplant home monitoring program. Software was designed to take case information and render it as Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) in a web browser. Twelve clinician readers reviewed twenty randomly-ordered, retrospective cases in each of three display formats (graphical, graphical interactive, and tabular) and determined whether they showed signs of infection or graft rejection. Decision times and reader preferences were also recorded. No statistically significant differences were found with respect to decision accuracy. However, the graphical displays yielded up to 25% faster decision times than numerical tables. Readers overwhelmingly preferred the graphical formats, particularly the interactive displays. We believe that graphical, interactive displays of patient data would be well-accepted and efficacious tools in clinical practice, whether for transplant care, or any care involving the assessment of large bodies of time-oriented, multivariable data.