Analysing the Suitability of Multiagent Methodologies for e-Health Systems

Online e-health systems are being proposed and developed at an ever increasing rate. However, the progress relies on the interoperability of local healthcare software, and is often hampered by ad hoc methods leading to closed systems with a multitude of protocols, terminologies, and design approaches. Agent-oriented software engineering (AOSE) seems intuitively a good approach for developing more open systems. While agent-based e-health systems have been developed, the general hypothesis of the suitability of AOSE has not been evaluated. In this paper, we test that hypothesis, including a case study of applying a normative agent methodology to a particular real-world e-health system, and present an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of AOSE for e-health.

[1]  José-Antonio Báez-Barranco,et al.  A Unified Model for Physical and Social Environments , 2006, E4MAS.

[2]  Schahram Dustdar,et al.  Quality-aware service-oriented data integration: requirements, state of the art and open challenges , 2012, SGMD.

[3]  Haiping Xu,et al.  Building a Health Care Multi-Agent Simulation Sysmte with Role-Based Modeling , 2010 .

[4]  Sabine Van Huffel,et al.  HealthAgents: distributed multi-agent brain tumor diagnosis and prognosis , 2009, Applied Intelligence.

[5]  Les Gasser,et al.  Research Directions for Service-Oriented Multiagent Systems , 2005, IEEE Internet Comput..

[6]  Frank Dignum.  Organizing web services to develop dynamic, flexible, distributed systems , 2009, iiWAS.

[7]  Michael Luck,et al.  Applying electronic contracting to the aerospace aftercare domain , 2012, Eng. Appl. Artif. Intell..

[8]  Eugénio C. Oliveira,et al.  A Contract Model for Electronic Institutions , 2007, COIN.

[9]  AGRE: Integrating Environments with Organizations , 2004, E4MAS.

[10]  Natalia Criado,et al.  A Normative Model For Open Agent Organizations , 2009, IC-AI.

[11]  Marc Esteva,et al.  AMELI: an agent-based middleware for electronic institutions , 2004, Proceedings of the Third International Joint Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems, 2004. AAMAS 2004..

[12]  Michael Luck,et al.  Towards a Formalisation of Electronic Contracting Environments , 2009, COIN@AAMAS&AAAI.

[13]  Ali Rammal,et al.  An Adaptive System for Home Monitoring Using a Multiagent Classification of Patterns , 2008, International journal of telemedicine and applications.

[14]  Sascha Ossowski,et al.  Extending virtual organizations to improve trust mechanisms , 2008, AAMAS.

[15]  Olivier Boissier,et al.  MULTI-AGENT-BASED SUPPORT FOR ELECTRONIC CONTRACTING IN VIRTUAL ENTERPRISES , 2006 .

[16]  Jacques Ferber,et al.  From Agents to Organizations: An Organizational View of Multi-agent Systems , 2003, AOSE.

[17]  Hans Weigand,et al.  Formal Specification of Interaction in Agent Societies , 2002, FAABS.

[18]  Scott A. DeLoach,et al.  Omacs: A Framework for Adaptive, Complex Systems , 2009, Handbook of Research on Multi-Agent Systems.

[19]  Jorge J. Gómez-Sanz,et al.  The INGENIAS Methodology and Tools , 2005 .

[20]  Olivier Boissier,et al.  Coordinating Agents in Organizations Using Social Commitments , 2006, Electron. Notes Theor. Comput. Sci..

[21]  Stuart Speedie,et al.  Service and model-driven dynamic integration of health data , 2011, MIXHS '11.

[22]  Estefanía Argente Villaplana.  Gormas: Guías para el desarrollo de sistemas multiagente abiertos basados en organizaciones , 2011 .

[23]  Krishna M. Kavi,et al.  A Methodology to Evaluate Agent Oriented Software Engineering Techniques , 2007, 2007 40th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS'07).

[24]  Michael Winikoff,et al.  Current Issues in Multi-Agent Systems Development , 2006, ESAW.

[25]  Stuart M. Speedie,et al.  Towards Achieving Semantic Interoperability In eHealth Services , 2012 .

[26]  M. V. Dignum,et al.  A Model for Organizational Interaction: based on Agents, founded in Logic , 2000 .

[27]  Frank Dignum,et al.  Autonomous Agents Adopting Organizational Rules , 2009, Handbook of Research on Multi-Agent Systems.

[28]  Vicent J. Botti,et al.  Engineering Holonic Manufacturing Systems , 2009, Comput. Ind..

[29]  John Mylopoulos,et al.  Modeling and Reasoning about Service-Oriented Applications via Goals and Commitments , 2010, CAiSE.

[30]  Munindar P. Singh,et al.  Comma: a commitment-based business modeling methodology and its empirical evaluation , 2012, AAMAS.

[31]  Franco Zambonelli,et al.  Developing multiagent systems: The Gaia methodology , 2003, TSEM.

[32]  Vicent J. Botti,et al.  Software Engineering for Service-Oriented MAS , 2008, CIA.

[33]  Lin Padgham,et al.  Using three AOSE toolkits to develop a sample design , 2009, Int. J. Agent Oriented Softw. Eng..

[34]  Radovan Cervenka,et al.  Agent Modeling Language (AML): A Comprehensive Approach to Modeling MAS , 2005, Informatica.

[35]  Javier Vázquez-Salceda,et al.  OMNI: Introducing Social Structure, Norms and Ontologies into Agent Organizations , 2004, PROMAS.

[36]  Michael Luck,et al.  An Agent-Based Approach to Real-Time Patient Identification for Clinical Trials , 2011, eHealth.

[37]  Estefania Argente,et al.  An abstract architecture for virtual organizations: The THOMAS approach , 2011, Knowledge and Information Systems.

[38]  Munindar P. Singh,et al.  Enhancing Tropos with Commitments , 2009, Conceptual Modeling: Foundations and Applications.

[39]  Munindar P. Singh,et al.  Service-Oriented Computing: Key Concepts and Principles , 2005, IEEE Internet Comput..

[40]  Vicent J. Botti,et al.  Developing Regulated Open Multi-agent Systems , 2012, AT.

[41]  David Sánchez,et al.  Organizational structures supported by agent-oriented methodologies , 2011, J. Syst. Softw..

[42]  Vicent J. Botti,et al.  Regulated Open Multi-Agent Systems Based on Contracts , 2010, ISD.

[43]  Virginia. Virginia Dignum . Dignum,et al.  Handbook of Research on Multi-Agent Systems - Semantics and Dynamics of Organizational Models , 2009, Handbook of Research on Multi-Agent Systems.

[44]  Javier Bajo,et al.  The THOMAS architecture in Home Care scenarios: A case study , 2010, Expert Syst. Appl..

[45]  Steffen Zschaler,et al.  A Model-Driven Approach to Interoperability and Integration in Systems of Systems , 2011 .

[46]  M. Taisch,et al.  Service-oriented architecture approach for industrial “System of Systems”: State-of-the-Art for Energy Management , 2012, IEEE 10th International Conference on Industrial Informatics.

[47]  Olivier Boissier,et al.  MoiseInst: An Organizational Model for Specifying Rights and Duties of Autonomous Agents , 2005, EUMAS.

[48]  Raman Paranjape,et al.  Multi-Agent Systems for Healthcare Simulation and Modeling: Applications for System Improvement , 2009 .

[49]  Scott A. DeLoach.  Developing a Multiagent Conference Management System Using the O-MaSE Process Framework , 2007, AOSE.