Drugs interaction checker based on IoT

Providing effective and appropriate healthcare is one of the most important objectives of information and communication technologies (ICT). Internet of things (IoT) is one of the last advances in ICT, providing a global connectivity and management of sensors, devices, users and information. Our contribution is a solution to examine drug related problems based on IoT technologies, i.e. smart phones and Web to support ubiquitous Access, 6LoWPAN technology to support ubiquitous data collection of patients, sensors and hospitals, and RFID/NFC to support global identification. These technologies offer a wide range of applications in healthcare, which improves the quality of services, reduce mistakes, and even detect health anomalies from vital signs. This paper presents how IoT technology is applied in a pharmaceutical system to examine drugs in order to detect Adverse Drugs Reaction (ADR), harmful effects of pharmaceutical excipients, allergies, complications and contraindications related with liver and renal defects, and harmful side effects during pregnancy or lactation. Thereby, the system provides an enhanced approach assisting physicians in clinical decisions and drug prescribing. The solution presented is based on NFC (Near Field Communication) and barcode identification technologies, which have been integrated in common devices such as smart-phones, PDAs and PCs. The drug ID is matched with the Pharmaceutical Intelligent Information System to detect whether a specific drug is suitable with respect to the patient´s health record or not.