Continuing my Proposal

I need to finish this thing up.

I've been hung up on the social-based multicasting work out there. After implementing social-based DTN routing in the simulator, I have to come back and write up a section in my literature about it. I've since lost the narrative thread I was on, and the semester's distractions aren't helping me find it again.

My ONE Simulator Contributions

Created a new page on my website listing all the software I've written for the ONE Simulator.

Opportunistic Network Environment Simulator

I've been using a simulator called the ONE (great name, I know) to emulate the movement of mobile nodes. The great thing about it is that I can import real world maps and make the hosts move along specific paths through them. I, therefore, picked none other than Pittsburgh as the basis for my simulation. Here's a picture:

I've probably been annoying the rest of my department as my simulations are taking up all of our condor computing resources. Some trials have been running for almost a month, and I'm starting to get annoyed. I have to reduce the number of nodes I define in the simulation next time.

Life's Dependencies

Was talking to my officemate about the average computer user and their poor computing habits (poor password choices, not keeping their software up-to-date), which essentially let's botnets flourish. It also gives those of us in-the-know a lot of power over anyone who doesn't care about the inner workings of their computers.

Most people don't care how it works, only that it works.

I'm not like that. I have to (1) know every system on which my survival and lifestyle depend and (2) how those systems work: Financial Systems, Food Distribution, Transportation, Utilities, Cars, Motorcycles, The Internet, Governing Bodies. I must know how they all work.

Requirements

Four requirements really dictate the design and influence the architecture of a tether-less patient system. I have to present them to avoid questions about why this architecture versus other possible architectures. Without further ado and straight from my proposal draft:

Mobility Support

At its core, the tether-less patient paradigm amounts to the introduction of patient mobility to the traditional hospital monitoring scenario. The primary goal is to provide a similar level of monitoring while the patient goes about his or her normal routine.

Pervasive Operation

Patients too encumbered by the system's hardware will be unlikely to adopt it. As such, the system must be designed to fade into the background of their consciousness, alerting their attention as little as possible and adding a minimum of extra hardware to their person.

Management of Healthcare Professional's Time

Healthcare Professionals have limited time and oversee multiple patients. Where it may not be possible to in any way limit or discard the information delivered to a healthcare professional, the system should incorporate algorithms to intelligently monitor the patient’s situation such that the healthcare professional only be alerted to the important aspects of the situation.

HIPAA Compliance

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 stipulates that reasonable steps be taken to ensure an individual’s health information is kept confidential between a patient and his or her current healthcare professional, both through policy and technical means, except under several specific cases or unless the patient provides written authorization indicating otherwise. It defines four broad security requirements for Health Information Systems: Access Controls, Audit Controls, Integrity Controls, and Transmission Security. Access Controls must identify the system’s users (healthcare professionals) and grant access to patient information based on the role the user is currently fulfilling. Audit Controls require a system to log access grants and other activities for a period of six years. Integrity Controls require a system to put in place mechanisms ensuring health information is not altered or destroyed. Transmission Security requires steps to ensure data is not accessed in transit over a network.