CSIG-VIS International Lecture Series 32
Prof. Michael McGuffin | Visual aids for patient communication:evaluating visual cancer treatment plans


Speaker: Michael McGuffin

Dresden University of Technology

Topic: Visual aids for patient communication:evaluating visual cancer treatment plans

Time: 2023/11/30 3:00pm

Abstract: High quality health care should include an informed patient who participates in treatment decisions. This is especially important when patients undergo complex treatments with multiple procedures that may span long time periods, as is the case for many hematologic diseases. However, comprehensive patient information is often hindered by communication gaps, which are exacerbated by declining cognitive performance of elderly patients. Here we describe our approach to support patients with visual treatment plans. Visual aids have been demonstrated to improve communication, but patient information so far is predominantly auditory, assisted with written information. To assess the information need, we first observed patient education meetings and interviewed physicians. We then developed prototype visual treatment plans for CAR-T cell therapy of lymphoma and for autologous transplantation in Multiple Myeloma patients. We then used a survey to evaluate the understandability and benefit of our visual treatment plans. Our data show that visual aids significantly improved information recall, when compared to auditive-only information. Moreover, participants stated that they were more confident in answering questions with our visual aids. The visual treatment plans combine minimal text with pictograms and icons; we next analyzed the clarity of these icons and showed that, despite being highly abstracted, they were identifiable by participants. Visual aids will only be used if they are easy for physicians to use and for patients to understand. We currently include patients in a feasibility trail of visual treatment plans, which actively involves our patient advisory board. We used a questionnaire to survey information recall in patients and, with a limited number of patients, also comprehension several weeks after the meeting. In addition we also surveyed for both patients and physicians if using the visual aids was subjectively beneficial. We plan to next analyze the benefit of visual treatment plans in a controlled clinical trial. As the complexity of new therapeutic algorithms can overwhelm patients, we believe that visual aids can facilitate patients' understanding, compliance, and quality of life.

Speaker Bio: Helena Jambor is a graduated molecular biologist with a passion for design. After completing a PhD at EMBL, she worked with multi-dimensional datasets, images and genome-scale data at the Max-Planck Dresden. While a scholar at the Wissenschaftskolleg (Institute for Advanced Studies) Berlin Helena Jambor researched biomedical data visualisation practices and today combines her expertise in analysing large data sets with her interest in data visualisation as a scientist at the University Hospital Dresden. Helena Jambor also trains and consults in life science data visualisation and since 2019 is a lecturer for biomedical data science at Berlin Hochschule für Technik.

Live Stream: Tencent Meeting:849-931-552 Password:231130




Session Chair: Xiaoru Yuan

Peking University







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About CSIG-VIS

The China Society of Image and Graphics, Technical Committee on Visualization and Visual Analytics (CSIG-VIS) is the first technical committee on visualization and visual analytics in China. The technical committee aims to develop a communication platform for stakeholders in academia and industry, to discuss the trends and opportunities in the era of big data, to promote the discipline development and talent cultivation, to push forward the research and applications in the related disciplines, and ultimately to build a sustainable ecosystem involving industry, universities, and other research institutes. The technical committee, officially established on December 23, 2017, already attracts more than 100 members from various affiliations, including domestic and international universities and companies.

About The CSIG-VIS International Lecture Series

The CSIG-VIS International Lecture Series, launched by the China Society of Image and Graphics, Technical Committee on Visualization and Visual Analytics, invites renowned experts to share their visions of the research trends and latest progress in visualization. These biweekly lectures are conducted in Thursday, and please refer to http://chinavis.org /lectures/english/index_en.html for details.