An Internet supported workflow for the publication process in UMVF (French Virtual Medical University).

The " Université Médicale Virtuelle Francophone" (UMVF) is a federation of French medical schools. Its main goal is to share the production and use of pedagogic medical resources generated by academic medical teachers. We developed an Open-Source application based upon a workflow system, which provides an improved publication process for the UMVF. For teachers, the tool permits easy and efficient upload of new educational resources. For web masters it provides a mechanism to easily locate and validate the resources. For librarian it provide a way to improve the efficiency of indexation. For all, the utility provides a workflow system to control the publication process. On the students side, the application improves the value of the UMVF repository by facilitating the publication of new resources and by providing an easy way to find a detailed description of a resource and to check any resource from the UMVF to ascertain its quality and integrity, even if the resource is an old deprecated version. The server tier of the application is used to implement the main workflow functionalities and is deployed on certified UMVF servers using the PHP language, an LDAP directory and an SQL database. The client tier of the application provides both the workflow and the search and check functionalities. A unique signature for each resource, was needed to provide security functionality and is implemented using a Digest algorithm. The testing performed by Rennes and Lille verified the functionality and conformity with our specifications.

An Improved Publication Process for the UMVF.

The "Université Médicale Virtuelle Francophone" (UMVF) is a federation of French medical schools. Its main goal is to share the production and use of pedagogic medical resources generated by academic medical teachers. We developed an Open-Source application based upon a workflow system which provides an improved publication process for the UMVF. For teachers, the tool permits easy and efficient upload of new educational resources. For web masters it provides a mechanism to easily locate and validate the resources. For both the teachers and the web masters, the utility provides the control and communication functions that define a workflow system.For all users, students in particular, the application improves the value of the UMVF repository by providing an easy way to find a detailed description of a resource and to check any resource from the UMVF to ascertain its quality and integrity, even if the resource is an old deprecated version. The server tier of the application is used to implement the main workflow functionalities and is deployed on certified UMVF servers using the PHP language, an LDAP directory and an SQL database. The client tier of the application provides both the workflow and the search and check functionalities and is implemented using a Java applet through a W3C compliant web browser. A unique signature for each resource, was needed to provide security functionality and is implemented using the MD5 Digest algorithm. The testing performed by Rennes and Lille verified the functionality and conformity with our specifications.

Comparative evaluation of two applications for delivering a multimedia medical course in the French-speaking Virtual Medical University (UMVF).

This paper describes a comparative evaluation of two applications delivering a multimedia course: a conventional web server (WS) and an integrated e-learning platform in the form of a virtual campus (VC). We used a qualitative method for comparing their acceptance of the on-line course provided by the two different interfaces. The two groups were globally satisfied. However, a decrease in satisfaction was noted at the end of the experimentation in the VC group. This may be explained by a more complex graphic user interface of the VC and some constraints which do not exist with the WS. Students from both groups also had limitations about the multimedia environment.

Homecare: the need for cooperative information systems.

Assuming responsibility of patients at home (Homecare) is organized around a complex cooperation of partners: health care actors, relatives and helpers, all of whom intervene in the patient's home and who spark off the setting up of cooperative information systems. We present our work relating to such systems within the context of home care. Such activity is based on the collaboration of multiple mobile actors, obtaining information in a multimodal fashion, while taking the job profiles and professional grades of the users into account. Information is obtained from heterogeneous systems. The quality of management of the activity of the various health care actors and of the feedback on information handled at the time of the homecare process will determine how easy it may be to set up homecare as well as the quality of care. In this paper we outline the main stages of our work: grasping the context of homecare and studying co-operative activity from a fundamental point of view but also as applied to homecare. We describe the system proposed for accessing distributed information and for organizing the supervision of the 2 fundamental processes: (1) the LOGISTICAL process (to manage the organization), (2) and the CARE Process (to follow-up the medical or nursing status of the patient), and then we enhance the contribution of mobile technologies in this context.

Comparative assessment of two interfaces for delivering a multimedia medical course in the French-speaking Virtual Medical University (UMVF).

The UMVF aims at helping medical students during their normal curriculum via the facilities provided by Internet based techniques. This paper describes a comparative assessment of two interfaces delivering a multimedia course: a conventional web server (WS) and an integrated e-learning platform in the form of a Virtual Campus (VC). Eleven students were arbitrarily divided into two groups. We used a qualitative method for comparing their acceptance of the on line course provided by the two different interfaces. The two groups were globally satisfied. However, a decrease in satisfaction was noted at the end of the experimentation in the VC group. This may be explained by a more complex Graphical User Interface (GUI) of the VC and some constraints which do not exist with the WS. The current e-learning platforms are probably not optimised for working conditions where presential and virtual activities are mixed. We think that a new type of "light" platforms should be developed for these specific working conditions. Students of the two groups also had limitations about the multimedia environment. They may change their opinion if they get more accustomed with the multimedia environment and if their teachers make a more adequate use of the multimedia techniques.

Security in the French-speaking Virtual Medical University.

The Medical Virtual French-Speaking University (UMVF) is a government sponsored program. The participating medical schools will share Web accessible scientific contents and develop their own teaching strategies and learner-trainer interactions. An e-learning platform will manage the access to the UMVF and its various resources. This access will require a unique identification/authentication. Users will then be guided toward those resources adapted to their profile. We recommend the use of a smart card for the identification/authentication. The connection should be secured via a SSL protocol when using critical resources such as assessment of a student, discussion between a student and a teacher and creation or modification of resources by a teacher. In other cases, secure connection will not be required. Usage rights of resources will be explicated. Critical data will be ciphered.