Tele-Board MED is a digital documentation system that allows doctors and patients to create electronic patient files jointly. So far, the research project “Tele-Board MED” focused on (a) needs of doctors/therapists and (b) interactions between doctors, patients and Tele-Board MED. The project yet has to illuminate (c) how patient needs can be addressed best by the system. When doctors and patients use Tele-Board MED, they dispose of a large tool-box. They can choose among many possible hardware setups (e.g., tablet computer or digital whiteboard). There are many different software features. Also, for the domain of psychotherapy, there are many templates which support typical therapeutic interventions (e.g., SORKC analyses). Both, among the software features and the templates some solutions are inspired by design thinking.

All three factors – hardware, software features used and medical interventions – can affect patient progress considerably. To trace how much patients benefit from their treatments, there are two lines of investigation that we would like to follow. First, we want to learn which hardware setups and software features best support patient progress. For that reason, we want to implement meta-analysis features for user statistics that show how often certain features were used. In addition, a mapping feature shall be implemented to trace which action was undertaken by the doctor and which by the patient. Second, we want to develop tools to estimate and communicate how much patients benefit from each medical intervention over time. Maybe, some treatments are perceived as “unpleasant” and “little helpful” at first, but as “very helpful” two weeks later. Design thinking inspired qualitative and quantitative feedback opportunities shall be implemented that help to trace patient progress and satisfaction. This feedback shall reflect how much a single patient benefits from specific treatments, both in subjective and objective terms. It shall also reveal how much all patients (of one doctor or of the whole clinic) benefit on average from each intervention.