Researchers in Dortmund, Germany, are working on a new exercise system that will provide doctors with data from the routines performed by people on a variety of machines.

A team from the Fraunhofer Institute for Software and Systems Engineering ISST is behind the new interface, which can transfer patient training data to a hospital information system. Scientists - led by project manager Sven Meister - have come up with the eTraining concept in a bid to improve the flow of data between doctor and training specialists.

It will enable medical professionals to ascertain how well patients are recovering from injury and how training programmes can be configured to provide better treatment. In partnership with supplier Ergo-Fit, the team has created a model that combines data with medical treatment details using Health Level Seven Clinical Document Architecture (CDA).

A CDA-based training plan has now been developed for specialists to use and explore how successful fitness training plans can be from a medical perspective. Meister said: "We're currently holding discussions with various bodies of experts in order to reach agreement on an industry-wide standard that also takes into account the needs of health insurance companies.

"If this exchange of information is developed further, it could potentially give rise to new business models, for example by transferring a greater proportion of rehabilitation work to fitness studios." Image: Dmitry Yashkin/shutterstock.com