Guideline Adherence of Medication Prescriptions in a Heart Failure Telehealth System

In 2014, more than 26 million people were affected by heart failure worldwide, with projections assuming a rise in prevalence. Besides the high mortality rates and a reduction in quality of life of the patients, a great burden is presented to the healthcare system by rehospitalisations. Telehealth systems can support the therapy for heart failure by involving the patient in the treatment process and educating them about their disease. Furthermore, health professionals have the ability to observe changes in the patients´ state of health and can intervene at any point in time. To provide patients with the optimal treatment, the European Society of Cardiology published guidelines for heart failure in 2016. Current studies have shown that the guideline-recommended target doses of heart failure medication are often not reached. The aim of this thesis was to develope a tool, for physicians in the "HerzMobil" telehealth system, which indicates a patients current medication as compared to the recommended target dose of the guidelines. During a focus group meeting, the concept of the "relative dose" was developed. This concept indicates the currently prescribed dose per medication group in relation to the recommended target dose by the guidelines. A module to calculate and visualise the relative dose, was specified and prototypically implemented in the HerzMobil environment. An overview of all heart failure-related medication groups, prescribed per patient and day, is given in this module. Also, a breakdown of related drugs per group, their daily dose and target dose according to the guidelines can be presented. Furthermore, it offers medical professionals the possibility to set a individual target dose, indicating the highest tolerance value of prescription for a patient. Finally, analytical methods were developed, that can conduct survival analyses based on the relative dose data of different medication groups for heart failure. The developed module and the analytical methods are present in a prototypical state. For