Personal Health Interface Design & Development
(Fall 2013 focus: Health Innovation with Google Glass)
HINF 5300
CS 5976 (DS: Advanced Mobile Application Development with Google Glass)
HINF 5976 (DS: Health Innovation with Google Glass)
HONR 4992 (Honors DS in Health Innovation with Google Glass)
College of Computer and
Information Science &
Bouve College of Health Sciences
Fall 2013
Information about Fall 2013 Team Projects
Class Location: 2nd Floor WVH computer lab
Credit Hours: 4 SH
Class Times: Wednesdays 6-9:00
(Additional meeting Wednesdays 4-5 for PhD students
Message Board: Piazza: https://piazza.com/class#fall2013/hinf5300
Instructor of record: Stephen Intille, Ph.D.
Office: 450 WVH
Office Hours: Tue 8:30-9:30 or by appointment
Phone: (617) 373-3711
Email: ...@neu.edu
Co-instructor: Rupal Patel, Ph.D.
Overview
This project-based seminar course (or special topic course/independent study) explores the design of innovative personal health human-computer interface technologies. Examples include assistive technologies that aid persons with disabilities, consumer wellness promotion applications, patient education and counseling systems, interfaces for reviewing personal health records, and eldercare and social network systems that monitor health and support independent living. Working in transdisciplinary teams, students will design and build a prototype personal health interface system to solve a real problem using Google Glass head mounted interface systems and mobile phones.
Topics surveyed in the course during project design and development cycle include participatory design, iterative user interface design methods for advanced mobile systems, health interface development, innovative sensing for mobile systems, software architectures for iteratively testing prototype personal health interface technologies, human-computer interaction issues related to personal health technology, and technology transfer requirements to support future validation studies of technology.
Advanced (PhD) students will cover these topics in more depth, discussing case studies specific to doing health research with prototype health interfaces with transdiscipinary teams.
Students in this course will acquire practical experience working in a team to develop an innovative health technology concept from idea conception to fully functional prototype. Students will also practice public speaking, writing, and team skills critical for success in the workplace. Technical students will develop programming skills for Google Glass.
The best interface technologies developed by teams in this
course will be field tested or used in personal health informatics experiments
by students who take a follow-up course in Spring, 2014 (HINF 5301: Personal Health
Systems: Evaluation & Field Deployment).
Course Objectives:
By the conclusion of this course, all students will be able to:
PhD students will additionally be able to:
Classroom Format:
Most classes will consist of seminar style discussion of assigned readings, followed by presentations by teams and then interactive design and development/programming sessions.
Students will be asked to make short presentations on the material to provoke discussion and tie the material together with their team’s project development. Some classes will be devoted to presentation of preliminary or final project ideas and receiving feedback from invited experts. Weekly readings consist of technical documentation, selected research papers and book chapters. For PhD students, some classes may consist of presentations from guest faculty describing case studies of needs assessment, development, evaluation, or dissemination of innovative health technologies used in research projects.
Individual-based coursework will consist of in-class presentations on assigned readings and design exercises. PhD students will have an additional 4-page (CHI format) paper describing the motivation for and technical innovation supporting a novel personal health interface system and a final paper describing how the system their team has built could be used in a specific experiment.
Team-based coursework (where each team member has well-defined roles) will consist of development of a fully-functional personal health interface technology using Google Glass suitable for deployment in a pilot research study, documentation of that system sufficient for someone other than the developers to use it, and a video or slideshow documentary showing the evolution of the technology concept and development pitfalls and successes throughout the semester.
Required and Optional Texts:
This course has a moderate but steady reading load with an average of 4-6 research papers per week plus additional readings on Google Glass technical development. Readings will be available online. Those that are not will be distributed in class.
Additional Materials:
None required. One Google Glass device and Nexus 4
phone will be available to each team for use throughout the course. Additional
sensors/devices will be provided as needed. Only 8 Google Glass devices are
available, which will limit the number and size of teams.
Course
Schedule/Outline: (somewhat tentative)
The class will meet once per week. PhD students in PHI 5300 will have an additional meeting time, additional advanced readings, and assignments, and a different weighting of assignments.
|
Week |
Discussion topics |
Readings due |
Assignment due |
Advanced readings due |
5300 assignment due |
|
Sep 4 |
Introduction to the course; introduction to personal health interfaces; next generation mobile interaction |
|
|
|
|
|
Sep 11 |
Case study exercise and the Northeastern campus project
Disrupting healthcare as we know it: one-minute brainstorming idea presentations
Low-fidelity prototyping (for head mounted interfaces); participatory design
PhD: getting started |
Part 1 (“The Digital Landscape: Cultivating a Data-Driven, Participatory Culture”) from Topol, E. (2012). The Creative Destruction of Medicine: How the Digital Revolution Will Create Better Care. New York, NY: Basic Books. (see email).
Introductory material on Google Glass
Rettig, M. "Prototyping for Tiny Fingers" Communications of the ACM 37 (4), April 1994. |
|
|
|
|
Sep 18 |
Technology to measure health states and behavior; sensors and pattern recognition overview
Glass Mirror API PhD: health needs assessment; community-based participatory research (CBPR)
|
Introductory technical material on Google Glass (check for updates) Be sure to have read all the Topol chapter from last week
|
Project concept presentation (individual)
[Teams assigned later this week] |
Selections from Schuler, D. & Namioka, A. (1993). Participatory Design: Principles and Practices. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. [To be scanned ... Stephen is working on this]
Chapter 1 from Minkler, M. and Wallerstein, N. (2008). Community-Based Participatory Research for Health: From Process to Outcomes. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Available via the NEU library as an online book).
Selections from Topol, E. (2012) The Creative Destruction of Medicine: How the Digital Revolution Will Create Better Care. New York, NY: Basic Books. Remainder of Part 1 (“Setting the Foundation”) and Chapter 4 (“Physiology: Wireless Sensors”), Chapter 7 (“Electronic Health Records and Health Information Technology”), and Chapter 8 (“The Convergence of Human Data Capture”). |
|
|
Sep 25 |
Strategies and tools for collaborative research system development
Research on future mobile interaction
PhD: Software architectures for PHI research systems |
Fogel, K. (2005). Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project. http://producingoss.com/en/index.html
GIT Getting Started documentation
Be sure to have read the Mirror API documentation from last week
|
|
Mandl, K. D., Simons, W. W., Crawford, W. C., and Abbett, J. M. (2007) “Indivo: a personally controlled health record for health information exchange and communication”, BMC Med Inform Decis Mak 7; 25. [+ related documentation online]
Estrin, D. and Sim, I. (2010) “Open mHealth Architecture: An engine for health care innovation”, Science 330(6005), pp. 759-760. [+ related documentation online]
|
|
|
Oct 2 |
Technology to analyze health states and behavior
Mirror API apps
PhD: Semi-supervised pattern recognition and HCI |
Read at least 3 of these papers that discuss microinteractions: Project Glass: An extension of self Pinwatch |
Collaborative tools setup
|
Chapters 1-3 from Part I of Witten, I.H., Frank, E., and M.A. Hall (2011). Data Mining: Practical Machine Learning Tools and Techniques, Burlington, MA: Morgan Kauffman Publishers. (PDF in dropbox).
|
|
|
Oct 9 |
Preliminary project concept critique (panel of guest experts invited to provide feedback) |
None |
|
Concept paper due (individual (Sunday morning Oct 13th) |
|
|
Oct 16 |
Glass hacking
Glass Developer Kit (hopefully)
PhD: Case studies on software architectures for PHI research systems |
Glass readings TBD |
|
Bickmore, T. and Schulman, D. (2009). “A virtual laboratory for studying long-term relationships between humans and virtual agents”, Proceedings of Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems (AAMAS), Budapest, Hungary. |
|
|
Oct 23 |
Influence of real-time feedback about behavior and physiology on behavior and habit formation
Glass nuggets
Glass hacking |
Heron, K.E. and Smyth, J.M. (2009) “Ecological momentary interventions: Incorporating mobile technology into psychosocial and health behaviour treatments”, Br J Health Psychol. Feb;15(Pt 1), pp. 1-39.
Rothman, A. J., Sheeran, P., and Wood, W. (2009). “Reflective and automatic processes in the initiation and maintenance of food choices”, Annals of Behavioral Medicine, 28 (Suppl), pp. 4-17.
Klasnja, P. et al. (2009). “Using Mobile & Personal Sensing Technologies to Support Health Behavior Change in Everyday Life: Lessons Learned”, AMIA. |
|
Cell Phone Intervention Trial for You Project NIH RO1 grant proposals
[TBD research papers on interactive learning systems] |
|
|
Oct 30 |
Iterative technical design and development strategies
Project progress discussion
Glass hacking |
Rising, L. and Janoff, N.S. (2000). "The Scrum software development process for small teams", IEEE Software, vol.17, no.4, pp.26-32.
Moe, N.B.,Dingsoyr, T. and Dyba, T. (2009). "Overcoming Barriers to Self-Management in Software Teams", IEEE Software, 26(6), pp. 20-26.
Other readings TBD based on class input/interests |
|
Student identified readings |
|
|
Nov 6 |
Privacy/security considerations for next-generation mobile systems
PhD: Privacy, security, and usability considerations for PHI research
|
Selected press articles on Google Glass
Intille and Intille, "New Challenges for Privacy Law: Wearable Computers that Create Electronic Digital Diaries," 2003.
|
mHealth Evidence Workshop (http://obssr.od.nih.gov/scientific_areas/methodology/mhealth/mhealth-workshop.aspx)
Kelly, P. el al. (2013). “An ethical framework for automated, wearable cameras in health behavior research”, American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 44(3), pp. 314-319.
De Montjoye, Y-A. et al. (2013). “Unique in the crowd: The privacy bounds of human mobility”, Scientific Reports, 3(1376), March.
Isaacman, S. el al. (2012). “Human mobility modeling at metropolitan scales”, MobiSys, pp. 239-252.
Prasad, A. and Kotz, D. (2010). “Can I access your data? Privacy management in mHealth”, USENIX Workshop on Health Security (HealthSec), August. |
|
|
|
Nov 13 (Rupal out) |
Team building; negotiation
and conflict management |
Readings TBD by guest speaker |
|
|
|
|
Nov 20 |
Technology transfer to deployment with research team; code testing and documentation |
None |
|
|
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Nov 27 |
No class – Thanksgiving holiday |
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Dec 4* |
Final project presentations (for panel of invited experts) |
None |
Final prototype, documentation, and video documentary due (team) |
|
Study design proposal |
Course subject content is tentative and may change based upon class interest or composition. Students will be notified of such changes.
* The Dec 4 date is tentative. Depending upon who is in the class and availability, we may try to move to Monday Dec 2, so that Dr. Patel can attend. We will work this out within the first two weeks of class.
Grading Procedures and Criteria:
Prior experience with project-based courses such as this suggests that work in this course will generally fall into one of four categories:
· Superior, striking, or unexpected pieces of work with excellent effort demonstrating a mastery of the subject matter and a thoughtful use of concepts discussed in class; work that shows imagination, clarity of presentation, originality, creativity, and effort.
· Good work demonstrating a capacity to use the subject matter, with adequate preparation and clear presentation.
· Work that is adequate but that would benefit from increased effort or preparation.
· Work that is inadequate but demonstrates understanding of some material.
· Work that does not demonstrate understanding of the core concepts in the course.
Course work falling into these categories correspond roughly to A, B, C, D, and F grades.
The final grade for the course will be computed by weighting the results from each assignment according to the following formula:
|
|
Non PhD students |
PhD students |
|
Individual brainstorming ideas |
5% |
5% |
|
Individual class reading presentation(s) |
10% |
10% |
|
Individual concept sketch |
10% |
25% |
|
Team Mirror API demo app |
10% |
5% |
|
Team project concept presentation |
10% |
5% |
|
Team preliminary project prototype |
10% |
5% |
|
Team final project prototype, |
45% |
35% |
|
Study design proposal |
N/A |
10% |
Brainstorming ideas
On a single page students will describe 2 or 3 concepts for the use of Google Glass to change healthcare, health, or health research. Each concept will be scored “go-forward,” “revise,” or “start fresh,” and students can resubmit this assignment as many times as necessary until they have at least two different ideas that get “go-forward” scores. One idea must relate to the Northeastern campus project. In the second class these ideas will be pitched in a “1-minute madness” session. Students will be provided with a template for the presentations and will be expected to have practiced the presentation in advance.
Class reading presentations
Students will prepare 3-7 minute “provocation” presentations on readings in the class or specific technical concepts related to Google Glass. These presentations will be designed to stimulate discussion, connect the readings to project ideas and other course content, and teach other members of the class important concepts or how to use development or project management tools. Students will be provided with a template for the presentations and will be expected to have practiced the presentation in advance. Presentations will be graded on adherence to the format and overall presentation clarity, as well as demonstration by the student of a thorough understanding of the topic being discussed. All students will present at least once and likely more, depending on class size.
Individual concept sketch presentation (+ paper for PhD students)
Students will develop an idea for a new personal health interface technology using Google Glass and present the idea to the class. Students will be provided with a template for the presentations and will be expected to make a polished and compelling pitch for a creative idea that reflects an understanding of the early reading in the course.
PhD students will additionally write a 4 page paper (CHI format) clearly describing and critiquing their idea. The paper should include references to relevant scientific literature and a description of the problem(s) the technology might solve, the technical innovation the project would demonstrate, and the technical implementation challenges that might be encountered with suggestions for how they could be overcome. The paper will be evaluated on how well the idea proposal shows that the student has independently conducted a background literature review and considered the readings in the course up until that point in developing the idea, as well as clarity, grammar, spelling, and overall organization.
Team Mirror API demo app
Teams will develop an innovative health app that primarily uses the Mirror API system. In most cases this app will be different than the app developed for the final project. The app must function sufficiently well so that the instructors and other students in the class can run it successfully on Google Glass devices.
Team project concept presentations
Student teams will prepare 8-15 minute presentations pitching their project ideas. These presentations are expected to be detailed and professional, and the ideas presented will be critiqued by guest experts who visit the class. Teams will describe the health needs met by the proposed technology, why the proposed technology is innovative relative to existing research systems in personal health interfaces, and a realistic plan for building a functional prototype that could be field tested at the completion of the course within the constraints of the Glass technology. Teams will be provided with a template for the presentations and will be expected to have practiced the presentation in advance. Collaboration tools for providing feedback on concepts must also be in place at this time.
Team preliminary project prototype
Teams will hand in (1) a fully-specified user interaction model for the prototype and low-fidelity prototype, (2) a system design specification for the final prototype, and (3) some functioning component of the final prototype demonstrating solid technical development progress toward the final goal. The prototype must include instructions on how to setup, use, and run the prototype on Google Glass devices and a description of what has been implemented so far and remains to be done.
Final project (prototype, presentation, documentation, and video documentary)
Teams will hand in a fully functioning prototype of a personal health interface system using Google Glass and mobile devices. The prototype must be sufficiently robust for deployment in a small pilot study to commence the following semester. Teams will hand in not only the functional software/system, but also detailed documentation that would allow non-technical health students to use the technology without assistance from the development team. Achieving the required robustness and simplicity to do this (while still demonstrating innovation in design and technology) will be one of the major challenges for teams. Teams will present their final system, ideally with a live demonstration, at the final class, when experts from Northeastern and the Boston area will be invited to attend. These presentations will describe the health needs met by the proposed technology, why the proposed technology is innovative relative to existing research systems in personal health interfaces, how the technology works, how the technology has been tested, and what the team learned during the development process. Students will be provided with a template for the presentations and will be expected to have practiced the presentation in advance. Teams will also hand in a short, stand-alone video or slide documentary that shows the progression of the idea from team formation and idea conception to final result.
Study design proposal
PhD students will write a short paper clearly describing a proposed study design using the technology that has been created by their team. (If more than one PhD student is on a team, each will write a proposal for a separate study). The paper should include references to relevant scientific literature, a description of the implemented technology, and a thorough description of a proposed experiment. The paper should address study population, sample size, feasibility, cost, and risks and offsetting risks, following the format of an R21 NIH proposal as much as possible.
Teams:
Some work in this course will be done independently, but for the most part this course requires transdisciplinary teamwork. Teams will be assembled by the instructors to ensure that teams are balanced in various areas of expertise required for the course project. Whenever possible, students with different backgrounds and skillsets will be paired.
Working in teams can be both rewarding and challenging, and one goal of this course is to give students experience working with a team of students who have complementary strengths and weaknesses. Students who have concerns about their team’s ability to work together or individual team members should talk with the instructor as soon as any problems are identified.
Students will be asked at the end of the course to evaluate the team as a whole and to independently describe their responsibilities and contributions to the team effort, as well as those of each of their teammates. These evaluations will factor into grade assignment.
Classroom Policies:
Students are expected to demonstrate qualities of academic integrity: a commitment, even in the face of adversity, to five fundamental values: honesty, trust, fairness, respect and responsibility.
Actively engaging in verbal exchanges of ideas and concepts
will be a major component of learning in this course. This will be stimulated
by readings, class discussions and case problem solving. Therefore everyone
will be expected to actively and positively listen to others and to communicate
their ideas during class. Some students are less comfortable speaking in class
than others, but open discussion of ideas and even disagreement is essential.
Therefore, all students are expected to read course materials prior to class
and will be called upon at times even if they do not raise their hands.
Participation does not result from talking a lot, but as a result of critical
thinking and articulation of ideas.
University policy dictates that students must seek the instructor’s permission to tape record class lectures.
To facilitate discussion and learning, electronic devices must be turned off in class, including laptops and mobile phones. Slides shown in class will be available on the course website within a few days after each class.
Please do not eat during the class unless you plan to provide food for everyone.
Writing/Presentation Policies:
Assignments that involve writing and presentation will be judged on clarity of presentation as well as content. Students who are having difficulty with writing will be referred to the Northeastern University Writing Center (http://www.northeastern.edu/english/writing-center/).
Late Policy:
Prior to an assignment due date, a student may request an extension with a reasonable explanation. It is the discretion of the instructor to permit late assignments. Unexcused late assignments will be subject to a reduction in grade of approximately one half letter grade per day late.
Academic Honesty:
All students are expected and encouraged to discuss the topics raised by this course with each other. Ideas incorporated from an outside source or another student must be documented appropriately in write-ups or presentations. Students must abide by the NU Code of Student Conduct (http://www.northeastern.edu/osccr/codeofconduct/index.html) and Academic Integrity Policy (http://www.northeastern.edu/osccr/academicintegrity/index.html). Acts of academic dishonesty will be referred to the Office of Student Conduct and Conflict Resolution.
Academic honesty is fundamental to the learning process. As a reminder,
Any
student found cheating on assignments or with software code that raises
concerns about potential cheating will receive a zero on that assignment. A
second offense will result in a failing grade for the course and reporting the
student(s) to the administration.
Students with questions about what is acceptable or unacceptable collaboration on assignments should ask the instructor.
Intellectual Property:
Intellectual property created in this course will be subject to the same rules as for any other course. More information on IP rights and regulations at Northeastern can be found here: http://www.northeastern.edu/governmentrelations/public_policy/intellectual_property_info.html.
Students must agree to allow another team of students to test the technology created in a subsequent semester, and so students should not propose ideas if they would not be comfortable with this arrangement.
Accommodation:
Students who have a disability are encouraged to seek accommodations though the University Disability Resource Center. Please speak privately with the instructor about your needs for accommodations and strategies to support your success. This information will be kept confidential.
Course Evaluations:
The instructor will distribute optional mid-term and final course evaluations, to be returned anonymously. Responses to the questions help to improve this course during the current semester and for future students.
All students are also strongly encouraged to use the TRACE (Teacher Rating and Course Evaluation) system near the end of the course to evaluate this course. A reminder about TRACE should arrive via email about two weeks before the end of the course.
Google Glass devices:
This special offering of the course using Google Glass devices was made possible by a gift from Google, Inc. The gift was received because Prof. Intille proposed to use the Google Glass devices for research on personal health interface technology; one component of that work is teaching this class. The instructors have a limited number of Glass devices, and so they must be treated with extraordinary care. Teams will need to time-share the use of the devices, checking them out from a lab in WVH and working with them while in the vicinity of the 4th floor of WVH. They are not to be loaned out or used by students who are not either in the class or authorized by Prof. Intille.