In recent years, there is a definite change in the manner in which health care is provided. The driving force promoting this change is an attempt to improve the efficiency of health care systems so that care can be provided faster and cheaper without a decrease in quality. In addition, recent advances in pharmacology, diagnostics and therapeutics are enabled through the fast and efficient investigation of materials and methods. The conclusion that new and valuable information can be extracted from these vast volumes of data, collected in the process of medical care and/or medical research, is a natural one. However, it also obvious that traditional medical and statistical approaches cannot face these challenges. Therefore, the scientific community is focusing on applications of intelligent systems. Such systems are investigated for application including data mining, diagnosis, prognosis, classification, optimization, imaging, signal processing, planning and many other areas which all contribute to the improvement of social welfare.

The European Commission has included so-called “eHealth” systems in all the previous research Framework Programs. “eHealth” systems according to the EC, must focus on prevention, early diagnosis and therapy and must allow self-care and home-care when possible. Such dynamic and personalized health care systems have the potential to improve and, at the same time, reduce the cost public health care. This vision will be completed in a large part due to the application of new technologies such as wireless medical sensors, digital technologies for home use, knowledge support, advanced robotics for care support and intelligent and dynamic computational technologies.

The Center aims to form an interdisciplinary group of researchers and forge close collaborations which will lead to applications of intelligent systems and networks in the area of health care. The team includes engineers, biologists and doctors and focuses, among others, on diagnostic systems, medical imaging, bioinformatics and telemedicine.

For more information contact: kios[at]ucy.ac.cy