Insights on the Development of PRACTICE, a Research-oriented Healthcare Platform

Abstract

This paper describes the development of PRACTICE,a distributed healthcare technological platform that supportsvarious research initiatives by the University of Milan and theAngelo Bianchi Bonomi Hemophilia and Thrombosis Center,Fondazione IRCCS Ca’ Granda, Ospedale Maggiore Policlinico.PRACTICE includes three main components: a mobile app thatpatients can use to self-acquire ultrasound images at home,a computer-aided diagnosis web application that supports thepractitioners through a set of machine learning models, and aset of web tools for image annotation, a prerequisite for trainingthe machine learning models. Although PRACTICE was designedin the specific context of supporting the detection of joint recessblood effusions in hemophilic patients, this paper describes themain design and implementation challenges that apply to otherapplications of a research-oriented health platform.