Nursing + Engineering = TEAM KID CHECK

Through a $25,000 grant from the Verizon Foundation, researchers in the Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering are teaming up with the School of Nursing to improve a program that provides health screenings to kids in poor rural communities.

Nursing’s Kid Check program allows Auburn nursing students to conduct health screenings of K-12 children in Lee, Limestone, Lowndes and Bullock counties. The free health assessments identify children at risk for chronic health issues and diseases and provide them with health education to modify the identified risk factors as well as referrals to area physicians.

One of the hurdles to the efficiency of screenings and security of patient information has been the paperwork each nurse uses to record patient data. Under the direction of CSSE faculty member Richard Chapman, wireless engineering students have proposed a system that will automate data gathering during the Kid Check assessments. Through the use of portable wireless devices, the system will permit instant statistical analysis of the data by Auburn nurses and students in order to recommend appropriate referrals, lifestyle changes and other information for the children who need them.

“This is a nice opportunity for the two colleges to be involved in an interdisciplinary project,” says Chapman. “This project gets the developers and designers out of the vacuum and working with the professionals who will really use the technology.”

While the primary focus is the accurate, confidential and instantaneous analysis of data in the field, the automated data collection system will also make important health data accessible to public health professionals, as well as state policy makers, while maintaining patient privacy. The system will be used by nursing students to conduct Kid Check during fall 2009 and spring 2010.