On the 5th of June 2025, the eCAN Plus Joint Action officially launched in Brussels — a major step forward for digital health and cancer care across Europe! We at the eHealth Lab are proud to be part of this initiative and even prouder to be leading Work Package 8: Capacity Building for Effective Telemonitoring and Patient Follow-up. The mission is to strengthen digital capabilities and ensure effective, sustainable telemonitoring and follow-up care, tackling health inequalities and promoting better outcomes for all patients across the EU. We were happy to reconnect with familiar faces and meet new colleagues who share the same vision. We’re excited to contribute and collaborate with all over the next four years! Stay tuned! Find or Share this Post on Linkedin:
SmartPLAIGO – Newsletter
The eHealth Lab – Cyprus University of Technology(CUT) collaborates with ERATOSTHENES Centre of Excellence, the Ambulance Department of the State Health Services Organisation, in Cyprus (SHSO), and Stremble Ventures LTD, to develop SmartPLAIGO, a Toolkit which will: improve the Department’s Response Times, and optimize the handling of the Ambulance Dispatch Fleets, using AI, real-time data and GIS, and building on the AVARIS Platform (developed by researchers in our team). The project enhances Emergency Response through intelligent routing and predictive modeling. See the first Newsletter on the SmartPLAIGO’s Website and below. Stay tuned! Find or Share this Post on Linkedin:
Paphos – CUT Open Lectures
To Cyprus Stroke Association, σε συνεργασία με το Stroke Alliance for Europe, διοργανώνουν Ανοιχτή Ομιλία στο χώρο του ΤΕΠΑΚ Πάφου, στις 14 Μαΐου 2025. Το θέμα της Ομιλίας είναι η Πρόληψη Εγκεφαλικών Επεισοδίων και Εμφραγμάτων Μυοκαρδίου“. Κεντρικός ομιλητής θα είναι ο κ. Ανδρέας Νικολαΐδης, Ομότιμος Καθηγητής Αγγειοχειρουργικής, της Ιατρικής Σχολής του Imperial College της Αγγλίας, και Επίτιμος Καθηγητής Χειρουργικής της Ιατρικής Σχολής του Πανεπιστημίου Λευκωσίας. Με την πρώτη ομιλία θα ξεκινήσει η Δρ. Μαρίνα Χαραλάμπους, Πρόεδρος του Cyprus Stroke Association, Γραμματέας του Stroke Alliance for Europe, αλλά και Ειδικό Εκπαιδευτικό Προσωπικό στο Τμήματος Επιστημών Αποκατάστασης του ΤΕΠΑΚ. Το θέμα της ομιλίας της θα είναι “Δραστηριότητες Πρόληψης και Ευαισθητοποίησης για το Εγκεφαλικό Επεισόδιο στην Κύπρο“. Καίριας σημασίας θα είναι και η ομιλία του Δρ. Ευθύβουλου Κυριάκου, Επίκουρου Καθηγητή του Τμήματος Ηλεκτρολόγων Μηχανικών, Μηχανικών Ηλεκτρονικών Υπολογιστών και Πληροφορικής του ΤΕΠΑΚ, με θέμα “Ψηφιακά Εργαλεία για την Πρόληψη του Εγκεφαλικού Επεισοδίου“. Μπορείτε να δηλώσετε συμμετοχή στον σύνδεσμο: https://forms.office.com/e/gSubVtV1wX Περισσότερες πληροφορίες για το χώρο και την ώρα έναρξης, μπορείτε να βρείτε πιο κάτω:
Our Team presented the SmartPLAIGO Toolkit at RSCy2025
The ehealthlab@CUT team participated in the 11th International Conference on Remote Sensing and Geoinformation of Environment (RSCy2025), which took place at the city of Paphos (Cyprus) from 17-19 of March 2025, and was organized by the ERATOSTHENES Centre of Excellence. Stelios Mappouras, the lead developer of the SmartPLAIGO Toolkit presented this smart system. The main purspose of the SmartPLAIGO Project is to develop a system that will optimize Ambulance Dispatching with real-time data to: – reduce response times– improve resource allocation By leveraging AI and Geospatial Analysis, the system predicts traffic patterns and determines the best routes, ultimately improving patient outcomes. SmartPLAIGO is funded by the Research and Innovation Foundation in Cyprus (CODEVELOP-AG-SH-HE/0823/0112). Find or Share this Post on Linkedin:
New Publication – Sharing Health Records through a Mobile App
We are happy to announce a New Publication (Research Article), where researchers from the ehealthlab@CUT contributed. Experts from CUT, UCY, CYENS and NeHA in Cyprus, along with an expert from the Semmelweis University in Budapest (Hungary) joined forces for the development of a mobile application in order to facilitate citizens in accessing and sharing their health records, directly, from their mobile devices. What is new here, among others, is that this Mobile App uses the (new) Smart Health Links (SHL) Protocol (https://lnkd.in/eaCjEc_S), it communicates with the MyHealth@EU OpenNCP System; CY NCPeH, while it supports multiple languages! The study has been publihed in Frontiers in Digital Health (available onine in February 15th 2025). This is an Open Access Publication. Check out more, here: https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/digital-health/articles/10.3389/fdgth.2025.1542485/full Find or Share this Post on Linkedin:
New Publication – AtheroRisk Software
We are happy to announce our New Publication, presenting the AtheroRisk Software.The project was completed in September 2024, and has been rated as Excellent by an independent European Reviewer/Expert in Radiology!AtheroRisk offers:1) Carotid Ultrasound Image and Video Preprocessing and Analysis2) Cardiac cycle selection 3) Extraction/analysis of meaningful families of plaque imaging features 4)Extraction/analysis of Carotid Plaque Motion 5) AI and XAI pipelines for carotid plaque segmentation, and explainable classification, respectively 6) Stroke Risk Prediction within a future timespan/Stratification of affected individuals, based on risk. Check out the Full Text Paper, here: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42979-025-03666-2 Find or Share this Post on Linkedin:
1st National Oncology Conference – Cyprus
From February 6-8th 2025, the 1st National Oncology Conference – Cyprus, took place in Nicosia and was organised by the Cyprus Society of Oncology. Dr Efthyvoulos Kyriacou participated, presenting the eCAN Joint Action and the Digital Tools developed for Oncology. This initiative focuses on integrating telemonitoring and teleconsultation into cancer care to enhance patient support and healthcare delivery. Through pilot studies, we evaluated the impact of digital tools on newly diagnosed and recurrent cancer patients, uncovering both opportunities and challenges. Our results demonstrate a positive impact on patients’ quality of life, while also highlighting key barriers such as user acceptance, digital literacy gaps, and the need for trained personnel to ensure successful implementation. Find or Share this Post on Linkedin:
Athens Digital Health Week 2025 – Dr Efthyvoulos Kyriacou
Dr Efthyvoulos Kyriacou, participated in the Athens Digital Health Week 2025, which took place in January 27th-31st. There he presented results from the eCAN Joint Action, its technical infrastructure and achievements, that were made possible based on collaboration between the ehealthlab@CUT and colleagues from the AUTH Medical Physics & Digital Innovation Lab. Find or Share this Post on Linkedin:
2 Projects in the MSc in Electronics Science and Technology Program
On the 21st of December 2024, students pursuing the Master’s degree in Electronics Science and Technology, an F2F-Hybrid joint Program between the Department of Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering and Informatics at Cyprus University of Technology and the Hangzhou Dianzi University, in China, presented a short overview of the work they have completed, so far. Two students are supervised by one of the leaders of the ehealthlab@CUT, the Adjunct Prof. Christos Loizou. Below, we share information on their on-going MSc Degree projects. Jiale W. Hou Impact of preprocessing in TRUS‐based prostate segmentation and MRI–TRUS registration AbstractThis study aims to enhance prostate segmentation in Transrectal Ultrasound (TRUS) axial images, by leveraging image preprocessing strategies, prior to deep learning model utilization, such as image intensity normalization, denoising filtering, and the combination of both. TRUS and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) sets of images (9 patients), were provided (with manual annotations of the regions of interest in TRUS), by doctors at German Medical Institute, in Cuprus. The TRUS images with prostate efficiently segmented will be registered and fused with the MRI images. Next, with a similar approach, we will test preprocessing methods to improve prostate segmentation in MRI. The results are expected to show a positive impact of preprocessing in prostate segmentation in both TRUS and MRI images, during brachytherapy. Yu Haohan Texture Analysis in Prostate Ultrasound Images Based on Different Pre-processing Schemes AbstractProstate cancer (PCa) is a significant health concern for men worldwide, ne-cessitating reliable diagnostic tools to improve early detection and prognosis. This study focuses on enhancing the diagnostic accuracy of transrectal ultra-sound (TRUS) images for PCa by evaluating the impact of various image preprocessing techniques, including normalization, median filtering, bilateral filtering, Wiener filtering, and non-local means filtering. A dataset of ultra-sound images from ten patients was processed to mitigate noise and optimize texture feature extraction. Texture analysis methods, such as Gray-Level Co-occurrence Matrix (GLCM) and Wavelet-GLSZM, were employed to identify robust features for classification. The results revealed that non-local means filtering (NLMF) outperformed other techniques in noise reduction and image detail preservation, achieving superior metrics for PSNR, SSIM, and CNR. Certain texture features, such as WHLHGLSH, exhibited high stability across preprocessing methods, making them suitable for distinguishing between cancerous and non-cancerous tis-sues. In contrast, features like GLCI showed greater sensitivity to noise, lim-iting their reliability. This study provides a systematic framework for improving TRUS image analysis and highlights the critical role of preprocessing in enhancing diag-nostic accuracy. Future directions include integrating MRI for multi-modal analysis and expanding the study to large-scale, multicenter datasets for diagnostic validation.
AVARIS – Emergency and pre-Hospital care Support System
On the 2nd of December 2024, Cyprus University of Technology and the ΟΚΥπΥ – State Health Services Organisation, in order to strengthen their collaboration in the health sector and benefit society, they signed 3 Cooperation Protocols, in a ceremony at the CUT’s premises. The protocols were signed by the Rector of CUT, Panayiotis Zaphiris , and the General Financial Director of SHSO, Mr. Robertos Karachannas. One of the Protocols formalizes the collaboration between eHealth Lab – Cyprus University of Technology (CUT) and the Cyprus SHSO Ambulance Service, which focuses on the development and implementation of Digital Tools to advance Emergency and pre-Hospital Healthcare. In a presentation, the Head of the Ambulance Service Directorate of OKYpY, Ms. Riana Constantinou described the current state of the Emergency and pre-Hospital Healthcare in Cyprus, and she strongly communicated her belief that the Digital Transformation of the Ambulance Service will contribute the most to saving human lives, constituing also a blessing for the entire country. The AVARIS Emergency and pre-Hospital care Support System was presented by our young and talented Research Associate at ehealthlab@CUT, Stelios Mappouras, the main developer of the AVARIS System, who was particularly praised by Mrs Constantinou for working 24/7 to develop a complete and seamless system. Outside the CUT premises, an ambulance was showcased, equipped with cutting-edge technologies for the provision of emergency care. Stelios is actively mantaining and advancing the AVARIS system 24/7 in close communication with ΟΚΥπΥ – State Health Services Organisation. In addition to this, the SmartPlaigo project, an ongoing funded initiative in collaboration with ERATOSTHENES Centre of Excellence and Stremble Ventures LTD, focusing on the automated management of ambulance traffic, was briefly presented. The Head of the ehealthlab@CUT, Efthyvoulos Kyriacou, Assist. Prof. at the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Informatics, stated that this collaboration with the Ambulance Service is an important way for CUT to contribute to meet the needs of society. The ehealthlab@CUT group members are proud of their Leader, who always inspires them to create impactful solutions and help meet the society’s needs. Efthyvoulos Kyriacou Assistant Professor at Cyprus University of Technology Find or Share this Post on Linkedin:
