Bioinformatics can be loosely defined as the collection, classification, storage, and analysis of biochemical and biological information using computers and mathematical algorithms. Bioinformatics represents a marriage of biology, medicine, computer science, physics, and mathematics, fields of study that have historically existed as mutually exclusive disciplines. Edited by Gavin Gordon, Bioinformatics in Cancer and Cancer Therapy, the focus of this book is to provide a historical and technical perspective on the analytical techniques, methodologies, and platforms used in bioinformatics experiments, to show how a bioinformatics approach has been used to characterize various cancer-related processes, and to demonstrate how a bioinformatics approach is being used to bridge basic science and the clinical arena to positively impact patient care and management.

The Workgroup Human-Computer Interaction & Usability Engineering (HCI&UE) of the Austrian Computer Society (OCG) serves as a platform for interdisciplinary - change, research and development. While human-computer interaction (HCI) tra- tionally brings together psychologists and computer scientists, usability engineering (UE) is a software engineering discipline and ensures the appropriate implementation of applications. Our 2008 topic was Human-Computer Interaction for Education and Work (HCI4EDU), culminating in the 4th annual Usability Symposium USAB 2008 held during November 20-21, 2008 in Graz, Austria (http: //usab-symposium.tugraz.at). As with the field of Human-Computer Interaction in Medicine and Health Care (HCI4MED), which was our annual topic in 2007, technological performance also increases exponentially in the area of education and work. Learners, teachers and knowledge workers are ubiquitously confronted with new technologies, which are available at constantly lower costs. However, it is obvious that within our e-Society the knowledge acquired at schools and universities - while being an absolutely necessary basis for learning - may prove insufficient to last a whole life time. Working and learning can be viewed as parallel processes, with the result that li- long learning (LLL) must be considered as more than just a catch phrase within our society, it is an undisputed necessity. Today, we are facing a tremendous increase in educational technologies of all kinds and, although the influence of these new te- nologies is enormous, we must never forget that learning is both a basic cognitive and a social process - and cannot be replaced by technology.

In the post-genomic era, a holistic understanding of biological systems and p- cesses,inalltheircomplexity,is criticalincomprehendingnature'schoreography of life. As a result, bioinformatics involving its two main disciplines, namely, the life sciences and the computational sciences, is fast becoming a very promising multidisciplinary research ?eld. With the ever-increasing application of lar- scalehigh-throughputtechnologies,suchasgeneorproteinmicroarraysandmass spectrometry methods, the enormous body of information is growing rapidly. Bioinformaticians are posed with a large number of di?cult problems to solve, arising not only due to the complexities in acquiring the molecular infor- tion but also due to the size and nature of the generated data sets and/or the limitations of the algorithms required for analyzing these data. Although the ?eld of bioinformatics is still in its embryonic stage, the recent advancements in computational and information-theoretic techniques are enabling us to c- ductvariousinsilicotestingandscreeningofmanylab-basedexperimentsbefore these are actually performed in vitro or in vivo. These in silico investigations are providing new insights for interpretation and establishing a new direction for a deeper understanding. Among the various advanced computational methods currently being applied to such studies, the pattern recognition techniques are mostly found to be at the core of the whole discovery process for apprehending the underlying biological knowledge. Thus, we can safely surmise that the - going bioinformatics revolution may, in future, inevitably play a major role in many aspects of medical practice and/or the discipline of life sciences.

The 4th International Workshop on Medical Imaging and Augmented Reality, MIAR 2008, was held at the University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan during August 1-2, 2008. The goal of MIAR 2008 was to bring together researchersin medical imaging and intervention to present state-of-the-art developments in this ever-growing research area. Rapid technical advances in medical imaging, including its gr- ing application in drug/gene therapy and invasive/interventional procedures, have attracted signi?cant interest in the close integration of research in the life sciences, medicine, physical sciences, and engineering. Current research is also motivated by the fact that medical imaging is moving increasingly from a p- marily diagnostic modality towards a therapeutic and interventional aid, driven by the streamlining of diagnostic and therapeutic processes for human diseases by means of imaging modalities and robotic-assisted surgery. The impact of MIAR on these ?elds increases each year, and the quality of submitted papers this yearwas veryimpressive. We received90 full submissions, which were subsequently reviewed by up to ?ve reviewers. Reviewer a?liations were carefully checked against author a?liations to avoid con?icts of interest, and the review process was run as a double-blind process. A special procedure was also devised for papers from the universities of the organizers, upholding a double-blind review process for these papers. The MIAR 2008 Program C- mittee ?nally accepted 44 full papers. For this workshop, we also included three papers from the invited speakers coveringregistration and segmentation, virtual reality, and perceptual docking for robotic control.

This series constitutes a collection of selected papers presented at the International Conference on Medical Imaging and Informatics (MIMI2007), held during August 14-16, in Beijing, China. The conference, the second of its kind, was funded by the European Commission (EC) under the Asia IT&C programme and was co-organized by Middlesex University, UK and Capital University of Medical Sciences, China. The aim of the conference was to initiate links between Asia and Europe and to exchange research results and ideas in the field of medical imaging. A wide range of topics were covered during the conference that attracted an audience from 18 countries/regions (Canada, China, Finland, Greece, Hong Kong, Italy, Japan, Korea, Libya, Macao, Malaysia, Norway, Pakistan, Singapore, Switzerland, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, and the USA). From about 110 submitted papers, 50 papers were selected for oral presentations, and 20 for posters. Six key-note speeches were delivered during the conference presenting the state of the art of medical informatics. Two workshops were also organized covering the topics of "Legal, Ethical and Social Issues in Medical Imaging" and "Informatics" and "Computer-Aided Diagnosis (CAD)," respectively.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 4th International Symposium on Biomedical Simulation, ISBMS 2008, held in London, UK, in July 2008.

The 19 revised full papers and 7 poster papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous submissions. The papers are organized in four different sections corresponding to key areas and techniques of this constantly expanding field: finite element modeling, mass spring and statistical shape modeling, motion and fluid modeling and implementation issues. An additional section covers the posters presented at the meeting.

This volume (5116) of Springer's Lecture Notes in Computer Science contains the th proceedings of the 9 International Workshop on Digital Mammography (IWDM) which was held July 20 - 23, 2008 in Tucson, AZ in the USA. The IWDM meetings traditionally bring together a diverse set of researchers (physicists, mathematicians, computer scientists, engineers), clinicians (radiologists, surgeons) and representatives of industry, who are jointly committed to developing technologies to support clinicians in the early detection and subsequent patient management of breast cancer. The IWDM conference series was initiated at a 1993 meeting of the SPIE Medical Imaging Symposium in San Jose, CA, with subsequent meetings hosted every two years at sites around the world. Previous meetings were held in York, England; Chicago, IL USA; Nijmegen, Netherlands; Toronto, Canada; Bremen, Germany; Durham, NC USA and Manchester, UK. th The 9 IWDM meeting was attended by a very international group of participants, and during the two and one-half days of scientific sessions there were 70 oral presentations, 34 posters and 3 keynote addresses. The three keynote speakers discussed some of the "hot" topics in breast imaging today. Karen Lindfors spoke on "Dedicated Breast CT: Initial Clinical Experiences. " Elizabeth Rafferty asked the question is "Breast Tomosynthesis: Ready for Prime Time?" Finally, Martin Tornai discussed "3D Multi-Modality Molecular Breast Imaging.

In recent years, there has been an explosion of research focused on using technology in health care, including web- and mobile- health assessment and intervention tools, as well as smartphone sensors and smart environments for monitoring and promoting health behavior. This work has shown that technology-based therapeutic tools offer considerable promise for monitoring and responding to individuals' health behavior in real-time. They may also function as important "clinician-extenders" or stand-alone tools, may be cost-effective and may offer countless opportunities for tailoring behavioral monitoring and intervention delivery in a manner that is optimally responsive to each individual's profile and health behavior trajectory over time. Additionally, informational and communication technologies may be used in the context of decision support tools to help individuals better understand and access treatment. Technology may enable entirely new models of health care both within and outside of formal systems of care and thus offers the opportunity to revolutionize health care delivery. This edited book will define the state of scientific research related to the development, experimental evaluation, and effective dissemination of technology-based therapeutic tools targeting behavioral health. Behavioral Health Care and Technology will provide an overview of current evidence-based approaches to leverage technology to promote behavioral health, including management of substance use, mental health, diet/exercise, medication adherence, as well as chronic disease self-management. Additionally, the book will define the state of implementation research examining models for deploying technology-based behavioral health care systems and integrating them into various care settings to increase the quality and reach of evidence-based behavioral health care while reducing costs.

During medical training there are certain parts of day-to-day tasks that are not taught at medical school nor in the traditional reference books. There are some skills that medical students are expected to learn by a ~osmosisa (TM) while on placement and under the guidance of junior doctors. These skills are never officially taught or examined in medical school. They are, however, a fundamental part of being a safe, good and efficient doctor. This book includes a ~golden rulesa (TM) or important points to remember and case examples, both of which are given as displayed extracts.

This book is designed to help the junior doctor unlock their potential and improve their performance, cutting the time it takes to achieve certain medical objectives. It is meant to fill in the gaps where the medical school and clinical guides stop. It gives the reader the information needed to organise themselves so that they can hit the ground running. It is not intended as a clinical survival guide, but more a friendly hand to allow the reader to get ahead in medicine and how to keep on track and develop a career path.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 4th International Workshop on Data Integration in the Life Sciences, DILS 2007, held in Philadelphia, PA, USA in July 2007. It covers new architectures and experience on using systems, managing and designing scientific workflows, mapping and matching techniques, modeling of life science data, and annotation in data integration.

The European Society for Arti?cial Intelligence in Medicine (AIME) was - tablished in 1986 following a very successful workshop held in Pavia, Italy, the year before. The principal aims of AIME are to foster fundamental and applied research in the application of arti?cial intelligence (AI) techniques to medical care and medical research, and to provide a forum at biennial conferences for discussing any progress made. For this reason the main activity of the Society wastheorganizationofaseriesofbiennialconferences, heldinMarseilles, France (1987), London, UK (1989), Maastricht, The Netherlands (1991), Munich, G- many (1993), Pavia, Italy (1995), Grenoble, France (1997), Aalborg, Denmark (1999), Cascais, Portugal (2001), Protaras, Cyprus (2003), and Aberdeen, UK (2005). This volume contains the proceedings of AIME 2007, the 11th Conference on Arti?cial Intelligence in Medicine, held in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, July 7-11, 2007. The AIME 2007 goals were to present and consolidate the int- national state of the art of AI in biomedical research from the perspectives of methodology and application. The conference included invited lectures, a panel discussion, full and short papers, tutorials, workshops, and a doctoral cons- tium. In the conference announcement, authors were solicited to submit original contributions on the development of theory, systems, and applications of AI in medicine, including the exploitationof AI approachesto molecularmedicine and biomedical informatics. Authors of papers addressing theory were requested to describe the developmentorthe extensionof AI methods and to discuss the n- elty to the state of the a

The Kuala Lumpur International Conference on Biomedical Engineering (BioMed 2006) was held in December 2006 at the Palace of the Golden Horses, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The papers presented at BioMed 2006, and published here, cover such topics as Artificial Intelligence, Biological effects of non-ionising electromagnetic fields, Biomaterials, Biomechanics, Biomedical Sensors, Biomedical Signal Analysis, Biotechnology, Clinical Engineering, Human performance engineering, Imaging, Medical Informatics, Medical Instruments and Devices, and many more.

A comprehensive survey of technological developments in Virtual Reality for use in medical education and simulated procedures

Medicine and the biological sciences have long relied on visualizations to illustrate the relationship between anatomic structure and biologic function. The new multidimensional imaging modalities are powerful counterparts to traditional forms of observation–surgery, postmortem examination, or extensive mental reconstruction. VR technologies have reached unimagined levels of sophistication and utility, giving physicians and students new avenues for planning and practicing surgery and diagnostics.

The two volumes of Information Technologies in Medicine thoroughly explore the use of VR technology in three-dimensional visualization techniques, realistic surgical training prior to patient contact, and actual procedures in rehabilitation and treatment, including telemedicine and telesurgery. Editors Akay and Marsh have brought together all the available information on the subject of VR technologies in medicine and medical training to create the first comprehensive guide to the state of the art in medicine for use by students, doctors, and researchers.

Volume I is devoted to the fundamentals of these new information technologies and their many applications in medical education and practice, especially in the area of medical and surgical simulations. Coverage includes:

• Virtual environment technologies
• The future of VR technologies in the twenty-first century
• Perceptualization of biomedical data
• Visualization in teaching anatomy

A comprehensive survey of technological developments in Virtual Reality for use in a variety of medical procedures

Medicine and the biological sciences have long relied on visualizations to illustrate the relationship between anatomic structure and biologic function. The new multidimensional imaging modalities are powerful counterparts to traditional forms of observation–surgery, postmortem examination, or extensive mental reconstruction. VR technologies have reached unimagined levels of sophistication and utility, giving physicians and students new avenues for planning and practicing surgery and diagnostics.

The two volumes of Information Technologies in Medicine thoroughly explore the use of VR technology in three-dimensional visualization techniques, realistic surgical training prior to patient contact, and actual procedures in rehabilitation and treatment, including telemedicine and telesurgery. Editors Akay and Marsh have brought together all the available information on the subject of VR technologies in medicine and medical training to create the first comprehensive guide to the state of the art in medicine for use by students, doctors, and researchers.

Volume II concentrates on VR technologies specifically in the area of rehabilitation and treatment and provides complete coverage of the most recent advancements in high-tech medicine. Specific treatments include:

• VR in neuro/orthopedic rehabilitation
• VR in treatment of anxiety disorders
• Robot-assisted microsurgery
• VR and the vestibular system
• Maxillofacial virtual surgery

The enormous growth in the field of biotechnology necessitates the utilization of information technology for the management, flow and organization of data. The field continues to evolve with the development of new applications to fit the needs of the biomedicine. From molecular imaging to healthcare knowledge management, the storage, access and analysis of data contributes significantly to biomedical research and practice.
All biomedical professionals can benefit from a greater understanding of how data can be efficiently managed and utilized through data compression, modelling, processing, registration, visualization, communication, and large-scale biological computing. In addition the book contains practical integrated clinical applications for disease detection, diagnosis, surgery, therapy, and biomedical knowledge discovery, including the latest advances in the field, such as ubiquitous M-Health systems and molecular imaging applications.
*The world's most recognized authorities give their "best practices" ready for implementation
*Provides professionals with the most up to date and mission critical tools to evaluate the latest advances in the field and current integrated clinical applications
*Gives new staff the technological fundamentals and updates experienced professionals with the latest practical integrated clinical applications

Most experts believe that innovation in every aspect of patient care will be nothing less than astonishing as we move into the next century. Technology and the Future of Health Care brings together a remarkable group of health care visionaries who have identified and begun to analyze which trends and technological advances will likely shape and inform the next generation of medicine. From fundamental advances in computing and administration, research, nursing, and patient care delivery to noninvasive surgery, biomolecular therapies, bionics, and beyond, this ground-breaking book offers professional, executive-level insight into topics that until recently existed only in the realm of science fiction.

Here are the proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Advanced Data Mining and Applications, ADMA 2006, held in Xi'an, China, August 2006. The book presents 41 revised full papers and 74 revised short papers together with 4 invited papers. The papers are organized in topical sections on association rules, classification, clustering, novel algorithms, multimedia mining, sequential data mining and time series mining, web mining, biomedical mining, advanced applications, and more.

A difficult and recalcitrant phenomenon, medical error causes pervasive and expensive problems in terms of patient injury, ineffective treatment, and rising healthcare costs. Simple heightened awareness can help, but it requires organized, effective remedies and countermeasures that are reasonable, acceptable, and adaptable to see a truly significant drop in the intolerable rate of medical mistakes. Only with better understanding, knowledge, and directed techniques can there be rapid and marked improvement in medical error management discipline. Since medical error is situation specific and involves diverse variables in equipment, environment, and human performance, the correct choice of preventive and corrective techniques is critical. Providing a wealth of useful ideas, concepts, and techniques, Medical Error and Patient Safety: Human Factors in Medicine uses abroad perspective to present more than 500 remedies that can be applied and tailored to your unique circumstances. This detailed review of so many measures enables you to correctly identify needs and undertake appropriate actions to achieve a success that can be measured in avoided injuries, improved healthcare, and reduced cost. Thought provoking and useful, this book considers the potential for error and the possibility for improvement in every aspect of healthcare. After an introduction to general concepts and approaches, it examines vulnerabilities in medical services, including emergency services, healthcare facilities, and infection control. It covers risks in medical devices and product design; human factors such as fatigue and stress; management errors; errors in communication at all levels of the healthcare hierarchy; as well as mistakes in drug delivery including faulty labels and warnings. The authors also compare and contrast several analytical methods, their interpretation, and their translation into a plan of action.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Third International Symposium on Biomedical Simulation, ISBMS 2006, held in Zurich, Switzerland in July 2006. The 12 revised full papers and 11 poster papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 37 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on simulation of biophysical processes, systems and applications, and anatomical modeling and tissue properties.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the International Workshop on Knowledge Discovery in Life Science Literature, KDLL 2006, held in conjunction with the 10th Pacific-Asia Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining (PAKDD 2006). The 12 revised full papers presented together with two invited talks were carefully reviewed and selected for inclusion in the book. The papers cover all topics of knowledge discovery in life science data.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Third International Workshop on Data Integration in the Life Sciences, DILS 2006, held in Hinxton, UK in July 2006. Presents 19 revised full papers and 4 revised short papers together with 2 keynote talks, addressing current issues in data integration from the life science point of view. The papers are organized in topical sections on data integration, text mining, systems, and workflow.

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Respiratory Support in Intensive Care" is a clear and didactic guide to the methods used to provide respiratory support in the patient with respiratory failure. It outlines the evolution of different techniques, explains the physiological principles, and evaluates their role in clinical practice.

The new edition has been thoroughly updated to take into account the increasingly sophisticated techniques used in this rapidly advancing field. It includes information on:
The increasing use of non-invasive techniques
Semi-automated techniques of mechanical ventilation
A simplified description of the most commonly used ventilators."

Respiratory Support in Intensive Care" will be invaluable as a sound introduction to the subject for trainee anaesthetists, intensivists, and all those who are responsible for the care of patients requiring respiratory support.

Resistance to Anti-CD20 Antibodies and Approaches for Their Reversal presents in-depth content written by international experts in the study of resistance to anti-CD20 antibodies and approaches for their reversal. Anti-CD20 antibodies are used to achieve B cell depletion and are developed to treat B cell proliferative disorders, including non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia. In the past two decades, anti-CD20 antibodies have revolutionized the treatment of all B cell malignancies, however, there are patients that fail to respond to initial therapy or relapse sooner. This book explores new and existing avenues surrounding Anti-CD20 antibodies. In recent years, several next-generation anti-CD20 therapies have been developed but predicting and reversing resistance is still a challenging task. These areas are being actively studied as they represent a potential to improve anti-CD20 therapies and are discussed thoroughly in the book. It is a valuable resource for researchers, students and member of the biomedical and medical fields who want to learn more about resistance to anti-CD20 antibodies and their reversal.

Practical Pathology Informatics introduces and demystifies a variety of topics in the broad discipline of pathology informatics with a focus on issues of particular relevance to the practicing anatomic pathologist. Early chapters contain basic information about computers and databases which is applicable to any discipline, with the later chapters containing more anatomic pathology specific topics. Chapters can be read in any order and are divided into short sections. Organized in an easy-to-read format, the book is aimed at providing pathologists and pathology residents with the practical information they need to make intelligent, informed decisions about the deployment and use of information technology tools in their day-to-day practice, and ultimately, better position themselves for informed decision making and intelligent communication with the information systems groups at their institutions. John Sinard, MD, PhD is Associate Professor of Pathology in the Department of Pathology and Director, Pathology Informatics Program at Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut.

With the rapid increase in the variety and quantity of biomedical images in recent years, we see a steadily growing number of computer vision technologies applied to biomedical applications. The time is ripe for us to take a closer look at the accomplishments and experiences gained in this research subdomain, and to strategically plan the directions of our future research. The scientific goal of our workshop, "Computer Vision for Biomedical Image Applications: Current Techniques and Future Trends" (CVBIA), is to examine the diverse applications of computer vision to biomedical image applications, considering both current methods and promising new trends. An additional goal is to provide the opportunity for direct interactions between (1) prominent senior researchers and young scientists, including students, postdoctoral associates and junior faculty; (2) local researchers and international leaders in biomedical image analysis; and (3) computer scientists and medical practitioners. Our CVBIA workshop had two novel characteristics: each contributed paper was authored primarily by a young scientist, and the workshop attracted an unusually large number of well-respected invited speakers (and their papers). We had the good fortune of having Dr. Ayache of INRIA, France to talk about "Computational Anatomy and Computational Physiology," Prof. Grimson of MIT to discuss "Analyzing Anatomical Structures: Leveraging Multiple Sources of Knowledge," Dr. Jiang of the Chinese Academy of Sciences to present their work on "Computational Neuroanatomy and Brain Connectivity," Prof.