Patient interaction in homecare systems to treat cardiovascular diseases in the long term

The rapid aging of the population worldwide will dramatically increase the number of people affected by chronic diseases in the next years. This social situation makes it necessary a paradigm shift from reactive care to preventive care. New technological paradigms, like Ambient Intelligence and Ubiquitous Computing, allow the development of Personal Health Systems (PHS) that guarantee the continuity of care and a better use of health resources. Therefore, patients should become the centre of the health care process, and PHS should be designed to fulfill the patient's goals and needs. User-centred methodologies provide a good framework for designing general use applications, but they do not usually take into account factors like the context where the interaction is taking place or the medical, social and business contexts that surround the patient. This paper presents a model for designing user's interaction in medical applications. The final goal is to develop highly usable user interfaces and to improve the user experience, aiming to guarantee the patient's adherence to the medical protocols and recommendations.