Building a Decision Support System for Automated Mobile Asthma Monitoring in Remote Areas

Advances in mobile computing have paved the way for the development of several health applications using smartphone as a platform for data acquisition, analysis and presentation. Such areas where mhealth systems have been extensively deployed include monitoring of long term health conditions like Cardio Vascular Diseases and pulmonary disorders, as well as detection of changes from baseline measurements of such conditions. Asthma is one of the respiratory conditions with growing concern across the globe due to the economic, social and emotional burden associated with the ailment. The management and control of asthma can be improved by consistent monitoring of the condition in realtime since attack could occur anytime and anywhere. This paper proposes the use of smartphone equipped with embedded sensors, to capture and analyze early symptoms of asthma triggered by exercise. The system design is based on Decision Support System techniques for measuring and analyzing the level and type of patients physical activity as well as weather conditions that predispose asthma attack. Preliminary results show that smartphones can be used to monitor and detect asthma symptoms without other networked devices. This would enhance the usability of the health system while ensuring users data privacy, and reducing the overall cost of system deployment. Further, the proposed system can serve as a handy tool for a quick medical response for asthmatics in low income countries where there are limited access to specialized medical devices and shortages of health professionals. Development of such monitoring systems signals a positive response to lessen the global burden of asthma.