Hydra, a Computer-Based Platform for Aiding Clinicians in Cardiovascular Analysis and Diagnosis

Summary

This article presents a protocol based on Hydra — a web-based system for clinical decision support that integrates a full and detailed set of functionalities and services required by physicians for complete cardiovascular analysis, risk assessment, early diagnosis, treatment, and monitoring over time.

Abstract

Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) are the leading cause of death throughout the world. The total risk of developing CVD is determined by the combined effect of different cardiovascular risk factors (e.g., diabetes, raised blood pressure, unhealthy diet, tobacco use, stress, etc.) that commonly coexist and act multiplicatively. Most CVDs can be prevented by an early identification of the highest risk factors and an appropriate treatment. The stratification of cardiovascular risk factors involves a wide range of parameters and tests that specialists use in their clinical practice. In addition to cardiovascular (CV) risk stratification, ambulatory blood pressure monitoring (ABPM) also provides relevant information for diagnostic and treatment purposes. This work presents a list of protocols based on the Hydra platform, a web-based system for clinical decision support which incorporates a set of functionalities and services that are required for complete cardiovascular analysis, risk assessment, early diagnosis, treatment and monitoring of patients over time. The program includes tools for inputting and managing comprehensive patient data, organized into different checkups to track the evolution over time. It also has a risk stratification tool to compute a CV risk factor based upon several risk stratification tables of reference. Additionally, the program includes a tool that incorporates ABPM analysis and allows the extraction of valuable information by monitoring blood pressure over a specific period of time. Finally, the reporting service summarizes the most relevant information in a set of reports that aid clinicians in their clinical decision-making process.

Introduction

Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) are a group of disorders of the circulatory system that constitute the leading cause of disability and premature death throughout the world^1,2. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), an estimated 17.7 million people died from CVDs in 2015, representing 31% of all global deaths^1,2. There are many risk factors for CVDs, including behavioral factors such as tobacco use, an unhealthy diet, harmful use of alcohol and inadequate physical activity as well as physiological factors, including raised blood pressure (hype....

Protocol

All procedures were conducted under institutionally approved protocols with patient consent.

1. Patient and Checkup Registration

Note: See Figure 1.

1. Go to http://www.varpa.es/Hydra/ using any modern web browser.
2. Use an existing account associated with a doctor to Log In to the Hydra web tool.
3. Fill in the patient registration form including patient code, date of birth, gender and ethnicity to register a new patient. Click on the include button to fill in the family background of premature CVDs. Click on the

Results

The patient registration described in step 1 is carried out by filling in the form presented in Figure 1. Once the user registers a new patient, the application moves forward to introduce the first checkup, which allows the input of comprehensive patient data. Figure 2 shows a screenshot of the first form of the checkup information. Once the Next button is clicked, the application moves forward to the second chec.......

Discussion

The early identification and monitoring of various cardiovascular risk factors together with an appropriate treatment are critical for the prevention of cardiovascular diseases and premature deaths. In the daily clinical routine, clinicians have to handle large amounts of diverse information to check all the different variables and parameters that affect the circulatory system. Hence, it is a tedious and time-consuming task that complicates diagnosis and treatment prescription.

The proposed pr.......

Materials

List of materials used in this article

Name	Company	Catalog Number	Comments
Computer with color screen	N/A	N/A
Internet connection	N/A	N/A
Modern web broser	N/A	N/A	Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, Safari, Fierfox, etc.
Blood pressure monitor	Spacelabs	N/A	Spacelabs 90217