DiabeticLink: An integrated and intelligent cyber-enabled health social platform for diabetic patients

Given the demand of patient-centered care and limited healthcare resources, we believe that the community of diabetic patients is in need of an integrated cyber-enabled patient empowerment and decision support tool to promote diabetes prevention and self-management. Most existing tools are scattered and focused on solving a specific problem from a single angle. DiabeticLink offers an integrated and intelligent web-based platform that enables patient social connectivity and self-management, and offers behavior change aids using advanced health analytics techniques. DiabeticLink released a beta version in Taiwan in July 2013. The next versions of the DiabeticLink system are under active development and will be launched in the U.S., Denmark, and China in 2014. We describe the system functionalities and discuss the user testing and lessons learned from real-world experience. We also describe plans for future development. ? 2014 Springer International Publishing.