Progress and challenges of ubiquitous informatics in health care.

Ubiquitous informatics in health care can be seen as its pervasively presence everywhere, at home as well as in office and patient room, for various purposes such as patient follow up, health care professional training, aid to decision making and to public health management. Its worldwide rapid extension could only happen in relation to major progresses such as overall availability of personal computers, diffusion through the worldwide web as well as coverage of almost all fields of medicine. Challenges include a profound change in patient-physician relationship, a reform in health care management and financial methods, as well as the need to identify uniquely all healthcare partners, while respecting confidentiality and private life.