A Physical Activity Recommender System for Patients With Arterial Hypertension

Abstract

Recommender systems have been applied in several areas, including e-Health systems, which refers to information and health services enhanced through technology. However, most studies aim at imposing rules to improve lifestyle, rather than recommending nutrition and physical activities. In this context, this study aims to develop a system for recommending physical activities for hypertensive patients to create opportunities for the patients so they can search for and create a healthy lifestyle. To achieve this goal, we elaborated on a hypertensive user profile model, called HyperModel2PAR, and a physical activity recommender system for hypertensive patients, called HyperRecSysPA. The model resulting from this study is composed of 32 elements divided into three groups, which were used in the modeling of user profiles within the system for generating HyperRecSysPA recommendations. The developed system was validated by physicians who answered a specific questionnaire. As a result, ~75% of the recommendations generated were approved. Therefore, this study has prospective contributions to the literature, since both models obtained conclusive results in the assessments performed.

Keywords

• Recommender system
• hypertension
• eHealth
• physical activity
• user modeling