Smart mobile systems such as microsystems, smart textiles, smart implants, sensor-controlled medical devices and innovative sensor techniques have become important enablers for telemedicine and next-generation health services, with social media and gamification adding further to personalized health (pHealth) as an eco-system. This book presents the proceedings of pHealth 2017, the 14th in a series of international conferences for personalized health held in Eindhoven, the Netherlands, in May 2017. The conference series, which began in 2003 as a dissemination activity in the framework of a European project on wearable micro and nano technologies for personalized health, presents advances in wearable or implantable micro-, nano- and bio-technologies for healthcare and wellness, and brings together expertise from medical, technological, political, administrative, and social domains, and even from philosophy and linguistics. The book contains keynotes and invited papers, as well as 16 oral presentations and 8 poster presentations. Encompassing diverse fields such as medical services, public health, prevention, social and elderly care, wellness and personal fitness, the book will be of interest to practitioners from various medical and health disciplines, as well as developers and administrators, provider institutions, and patient and citizens representatives.

Significant changes have taken place in the policy landscape surrounding cannabis legalization, production, and use. During the past 20 years, 25 states and the District of Columbia have legalized cannabis and/or cannabidiol (a component of cannabis) for medical conditions or retail sales at the state level and 4 states have legalized both the medical and recreational use of cannabis. These landmark changes in policy have impacted cannabis use patterns and perceived levels of risk. However, despite this changing landscape, evidence regarding the short- and long-term health effects of cannabis use remains elusive. While a myriad of studies have examined cannabis use in all its various forms, often these research conclusions are not appropriately synthesized, translated for, or communicated to policy makers, health care providers, state health officials, or other stakeholders who have been charged with influencing and enacting policies, procedures, and laws related to cannabis use. Unlike other controlled substances such as alcohol or tobacco, no accepted standards for safe use or appropriate dose are available to help guide individuals as they make choices regarding the issues of if, when, where, and how to use cannabis safely and, in regard to therapeutic uses, effectively. Shifting public sentiment, conflicting and impeded scientific research, and legislative battles have fueled the debate about what, if any, harms or benefits can be attributed to the use of cannabis or its derivatives, and this lack of aggregated knowledge has broad public health implications. The Health Effects of Cannabis and Cannabinoids provides a comprehensive review of scientific evidence related to the health effects and potential therapeutic benefits of cannabis. This report provides a research agendaâ€"outlining gaps in current knowledge and opportunities for providing additional insight into these issuesâ€"that summarizes and prioritizes pressing research needs.

Smart mobile systems – microsystems, smart textiles, smart implants, sensor-controlled medical devices – together with related body, local and wide-area networks up to cloud services, have become important enablers for telemedicine and the next generation of healthcare services. The multilateral benefits of pHealth technologies offer enormous potential for all stakeholder communities, not only in terms of improvements in medical quality and industrial competitiveness, but also for the management of healthcare costs and, last but not least, the improvement of patient experience. This book presents the proceedings of pHealth 2021, the 18th in a series of conferences on wearable micro and nano technologies for personalized health with personal health management systems, hosted by the University of Genoa, Italy, and held as an online event from 8 – 10 November 2021. The conference focused on digital health ecosystems in the transformation of healthcare towards personalized, participative, preventive, predictive precision medicine (5P medicine). The book contains 46 peer-reviewed papers (1 keynote, 5 invited papers, 33 full papers, and 7 poster papers). Subjects covered include the deployment of mobile technologies, micro-nano-bio smart systems, bio-data management and analytics, autonomous and intelligent systems, the Health Internet of Things (HIoT), as well as potential risks for security and privacy, and the motivation and empowerment of patients in care processes. Providing an overview of current advances in personalized health and health management, the book will be of interest to all those working in the field of healthcare today.

Personalized health technologies offer many benefits. Smart mobile systems, textiles and implants and sensor-controlled medical devices have become important enablers for telemedicine and ubiquitous pervasive health as the next-generation health services, while social media and gamification have added another dimension to pHealth as an eco-system. This book presents the proceedings of pHealth 2022, the 19th in the conference series, held as a hybrid event in Oslo, Norway, from 8 – 10 November 2022. The pHealth 2022 conference attracted experts from many scientific domains and brought together health-service vendor and provider institutions, payer organizations, government departments, academic institutions, professional bodies, and patients and citizen representatives. Topics covered include mobile technologies, micro-nano-bio smart systems, bio-data management and analytics, machine learning, artificial intelligence and robotics for personalized health, the Health Internet of Things (HIoT), systems medicine, public health and virtual care. The book includes 2 keynote papers, 10 invited papers, 20 full papers, and 4 poster papers by 113 authors from 23 countries. All submissions were carefully and critically reviewed by at least two independent experts from a country other than the author’s home country, and additionally by at least one member of the Scientific Program Committee, guaranteeing a high scientific level of the accepted and ultimately published papers. Exploring the enormous potential of pHealth for improvements in medical quality and also for the management of healthcare costs and the provision of a better patient experience, the book will be of interest to all those involved in the development and provision of healthcare.

The pressure of climate change, environmental degradation, and urbanisation, as well as the widening of socio- economic disparities have rendered the global population increasingly vulnerable to the impact of natural disasters. With a primary focus on medical and public health humanitarian response to disasters, Public Health Humanitarian Responses to Natural Disasters provides a timely critical analysis of public health responses to natural disasters. Using a number of case studies and examples of innovative disaster response measures developed by international agencies and stakeholders, this book illustrates how theoretical understanding of public health issues can be practically applied in the context of humanitarian relief response. Starting with an introduction to public health principles within the context of medical and public health disaster and humanitarian response, the book goes on to explore key trends, threats and challenges in contemporary disaster medical response. This book provides a comprehensive overview of an emergent discipline and offers a unique multidisciplinary perspective across a range of relevant topics including the concepts of disaster preparedness and resilience, and key challenges in human health needs for the twenty-first century. This book will be of interest to students of public health, disaster and emergency medicine and development studies, as well as to development and medical practitioners working within NGOs, development agencies, health authorities and public administration.

Medical informatics is a field which continues to evolve with developments and improvements in foundational methods, applications, and technology, constantly offering opportunities for supporting the customization of healthcare to individual patients. This book presents the proceedings of the 16th World Congress of Medical and Health Informatics (MedInfo2017), held in Hangzhou, China, in August 2017, which also marked the 50th anniversary of the International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA). The central theme of MedInfo2017 was "Precision Healthcare through Informatics", and the scientific program was divided into five tracks: connected and digital health; human data science; human, organizational, and social aspects; knowledge management and quality; and safety and patient outcomes. The 249 accepted papers and 168 posters included here span the breadth and depth of sub-disciplines in biomedical and health informatics, such as clinical informatics; nursing informatics; consumer health informatics; public health informatics; human factors in healthcare; bioinformatics; translational informatics; quality and safety; research at the intersection of biomedical and health informatics; and precision medicine. The book will be of interest to all those who wish to keep pace with advances in the science, education, and practice of biomedical and health informatics worldwide.

The book acts as a guide, taking the reader into the smart system domain and providing theoretical and practical knowledge along with case studies in smart healthcare. The book uses a blend of interdisciplinary approaches such as IoT, blockchain, augmented reality, and virtual reality for the implementation of cost-effective, real-time, and user-friendly solutions for healthcare problems. Immersive Virtual and Augmented Reality in Healthcare: An IoT and Blockchain Perspective presents the trends, best practices, techniques, developments, sensors, materials, and case studies that are using augmented and virtual reality environments with the state-of-the-art latest technologies like IoT, blockchain, and machine learning in the implementation of healthcare systems. The book focuses on the design and implementation of smart healthcare systems with major challenges to further explore more robust and efficient healthcare solutions in terms of low cost, faster algorithms, more sensitive IoT sensors, faster data communication, and real-time solutions for treatment. It discusses the use of virtual and augmented reality and how it can provide user-friendly and interactive communication within healthcare systems. Illustrated through case studies, the book conveys how different hospitals and healthcare equipment providers can adopt good practices found in the book to improve the performance/productivity of their staff and system. The content is rounded out by providing how IoT, blockchain, and artificial intelligence can provide the framework for designing and/or upgrading traditional healthcare systems by increasing security and data privacy. A valuable resource for engineers working with systems, the healthcare professionals involved in the design and development of healthcare devices and systems, researcher scholars, multidisciplinary scientists, students, and academics who are wishing to explore the use of virtual and augmented reality in new and existing healthcare systems.