We are so happy to announce that the follow-up project of PathMate entitled PathMate2: The Impact of Health Information System Services on the Effects of Therapy in Overweight Teenagers was accepted by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF) and Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).

The overall goal of the research project PathMate2 is help support obese children, their parents and their physicians with modern technology in creating a healthier lifestyle. Computer scientists, engineers and medical experts are collaborating in this interdisciplinary project in order to develop an information system, which will allow obese children and their physicians to stay in touch. Some of the good intentions and plans made during on-site consultations are forgotten soon thereafter. It is therefore especially important that obese children make the right decisions in their lifestyle and diet in their everyday life. With the help of PathMate2, physicians will be able to analyse the data of their patients in real time, provide them with tips or challenges tailored to their needs, and thus motivate them to make healthier choices.

In Switzerland, one out of five children remain overweight or obese and novel methods are needed to control the epidemic. Severe co-morbidities appear already during childhood, track into adulthood obesity in more than 75% and contribute to a drastic increase in public health costs due to overweight and obesity-related co-morbidities. Multi-professional programs combining physical activity, nutritional and behavioral components have positive effects on therapy outcomes, but these interventions are cost-intensive and time-consuming for both health providers and overweight children and their parents, in particular, those living in rural regions.

Building upon past experience and preliminary results of PathMate with a limited number of children and teenagers, the follow-up project PathMate2 has the following detailed objectives:

1. to establish evidence-based obesity interventions that move the focus from on-site consultations in expensive and highly specialised obesity centres to appealing, child-friendly IT-mediated low-threshold interventions under the supervision of general practitioners and obesity expert teams,
2. To automatically capture and process obesity-related biosignals by smart sensors and using results for immediate feedback for patients, medical personnel, and others based on permissions and communication patterns,
3. to design of evidence-based self-regulation interventions for children and teenager in their everyday life by coupling Neuro-Information-Systems services with Smart Health Sensors, and finally,
4. to make a significant contribution in the improvement of the quality of information systems in healthcare.

Our research partners in this project are …

• Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Maass, Chair in Business Administration, Saarland University, Germany
• Prof. Dr. med. Dagmar l’Allemand, Dept. of Paediatric Endocrinology / Diabetology, Ostschweizer Kinderspital, St. Gallen (KISPI)
• PD Dr. med. Nathalie J. Farpour-Lambert, Head, Obesity Care Program, Medical Direction and Service of Therapeutic Education for Chronic Disease, Department of Community Medicine, Primary Care and Emergency, University Hospital of Geneva / University of Geneva (HUG/UNIGE)