UG Exam Database Project
Medical students studying within the University of Ottawa’s Department of Family Medicine are currently responsible for satisfactorily completing exams every 12-weeks during their academic calendar. These exams are administered by the Undergraduate team within the Department of Family Medicine using exams developed and stored within an Excel spreadsheet. This spreadsheet uses carefully developed calculations within the spreadsheet to maintain student data and exam submissions. In order to make this exam process more efficient and secure, the UG Exam Database project aims to develop an accessible, password-protected exam database that would enable the Undergraduate Director and Admin to sort, filter and create exams using a built-in search engine. Through the development of this new Database project, special attention will be given to maintaining historical exam data and analysis. This project aims to develop a secure database that allows its admin users the ability to select exam questions using filters like date and question topic.
The UG Exam Database project will be undertaken by a group of 4th year University of Ottawa students who will be collaborating with Department of Family Medicine staff as part of their Capstone project. Work on this project will begin in January 2023 and will be ongoing under the direction of our Education team.
Doc In a Box Project
Aimed at addressing shortages in primary care providers in remote and northern communities, the Doc in a Box project aims to improve access to medical diagnoses and treatment plans through the development of an offline medical database. In collaboration with the University of Ottawa’s Makerlab, this project will bridge the gap in accessing reliable healthcare in isolated communities or communities with poor broadband connectivity by providing the tools for reliable diagnosis and treatment directly to community members in accessible language. Drawing inspiration from the medical database being developed for astronauts heading to Mars, this project aims to use a similar offline database solution to address gaps in primary care in Canada.
Work on the Doc in the Box project will be ongoing with research undertaken into reliable AI diagnoses and plug-in tools such as wireless stethoscopes or thermometers for more accurate symptom identification.
Mental Health Applications Project
Premised on the understanding that many people in Ontario do not have access to adequate mental health services, the Jiffy App for Mental Health is an application that allows individuals to meet with doctors for virtual consultations. Developed through the University of Ottawa’s Makerlab, this free application will be available for download from the Apple or Android store with consultation fees charged in-app by mental health professionals for consultations and conversations. Through developing the Jiffy App for Mental Health, the project team aims to improve access to mental health resources for all users of the application.
SimCity Ottawa Project
Inspired by the popular life simulation video game franchise The Sims, the SimCity Ottawa project is a game developed to simulate life as a family physician and presents the player with options that require them to balance the competing demands of work and life. This educational game was developed in partnership with Department of Family Medicine leaders as a Capstone project by a team of University of Ottawa engineering students. In the Sim City Ottawa game, players are asked to set parameters for their life at the beginning of the game: will they be practicing in a clinic, emergency room, hospital coverage, specialization and what will their personal life look like? Following this, players will be asked to select 4 core values that will either positively or negatively affect their Sim as the player makes choices and moves through the game. The overall educational purpose of this game is to help players understand work/life balance and help them reflect on the cumulative effects of everyday decisions.
Work on the SimCity Ottawa project began in 2022 and will continue into 2023 with a new team of undergraduate students taking over the development of the SimCity Ottawa game. under the direction of Dr. Kheira Jolin-Dahel and Dr. Jonah Marek.
My Medication Records Application Project
The MyMedRec app (My Medication Records application) has undergone an initial revamp to conduct a randomized controlled trial to further identify ways of improving the app. The application will be tested for usability and improved further, based on participants' feedback.
The application is a portable, up-to-date health record that can be easily shared with your family, doctor, nurse, pharmacist or anyone else involved in your healthcare. It keeps track of the medicines that you and your family members are taking, and many other elements related to your health. It can be used to remind you when to take a dose and when to refill your prescription. With the My Medical Records Application, all your important health information in one easily accessible, user-friendly place.
Addressing the Unattached Patient Project
The National Capital Region is approaching 100k or 10% of the population that cannot find a primary care physician. While there is the Provincial portal to add your name to the list, unfortunately, this results in extremely long wait times. At the end of it all, patients looking for doctors' resort to Google and search in expanding concentric circles from their home address in the hopes of finding doctors accepting new patients. To compound this problem, many doctors are approaching retirement age, with some accelerating their retirement due to the stresses of COVID. However, due to the complexity of some practice plans and the financial model in the province, the retiring doctors are finding it challenging to locate a doctor to take over their practice. This additional difficulty will only exacerbate the problem.
The Department of Family Medicine continues to crowdsource an innovative solution that helps address this critical need and advance the discipline of family medicine.
In doing so we have and continue to develop several applications that could allow more doctors to practice and see more patients through a combination of remote or telemedicine and new technologies.
CHAT (Continuity Health Attachment Technology) Application
CHAT is an innovative health information technology system serving to map patients regionally to a provider based on both patient and provider preferences. As pitched by the winning team at the Department of Family Medicine’s inaugural Dragon’s Den [please link to video Ryan created], the CHAT app has been designed to ensure that all Canadian residents who want a Primary Care Physician have access to one. As primary care is increasingly evolving towards a patient- centered approach, the app pays close attention to personalized detail for providing a best-match attune to patient needs and preferences. Allowing the patient to make the match promotes autonomy to choose who provides their care and breaks down some of the existing barriers and health disparities because PCPs express a greater disinterest in accepting patients with high needs, including chronically ill patients and seniors.
MakerLab’s approach to the Unattached Patient
Taking advantage of new technologies in telemedicine, the Unattached Patient project aims to create a centralized online platform capable of connecting patients to primary care physicians. With a focus on economizing cost structures by sharing online infrastructure, the Unattached Patient project aims to enable primary care physicians to treat a higher number of patients daily through the use of new technologies thereby lowering the number of people in the National Capital Region that cannot find a primary care physician. By enabling physicians to treat more patients during their working hours, the Unattached Patient project seeks to create larger systemic changes by increasing the number of Ontarians attached to each primary care physician. Team One's Solution