[Naman Chauhan]’s 2017 Hackaday Prize entry consists of a heartbeat detection and monitoring system that centers around everyone’s favorite WiFi board, the ESP8266. The monitor is hooked up to the patient’s finger, keeping track of his or her vitals and publishing the data on the cloud.
By using Thingspeak to manage the data, [Naman] leverages the platform’s data visualization and analytical features. Also, by making the data accessible on the cloud, he offers an intriguing opportunity to help friends and relatives to monitor the data. If you think about it, if you had a loved one in the hospital, wouldn’t having all of his or her chart available on your phone be great?
I don’t know what it’s like in countries other than Australia but here patient data is confidential. And there is a couple of reasons for it.
1/ just plain old privacy.
2/ A little bit of knowledge is dangerous. Having some well meaning but ignorant relative seeing a live stream of patient data would be hell for the nursing staff.
That does not seem like a country issue. The social norms for people tend lean to privacy. And in this case it seems as if your own feelings are having a skew on it as well. This is not a criticism just a observation. Now that being said the simple fact that is made for monitoring on a full time basis allows you to record your own data for personal and for a doctor to review your stats. In the case of you monitoring a loved one. That can be because the person being monitored, either,
A. Needs someone to monitor them during times of stress.
B. During a bout of incapacitation.
C. Due to a person not being able to cognizantly monitor themselves. Such as Alzheimers / Demetia, Etc.
I could go on but you can see that there would be a need where someone else should and can keep track for life saving reasons. And that is the best reason for any info to be given scrutiny.