Date of Award
Fall 2020
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Science (MS)
Department
Computer Science
Program
Computing
First Advisor
Ahamed, Sheikh Iqbal
Second Advisor
Sikder, Abdur
Third Advisor
Iqbal, Anik
Abstract
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is the most prevalent among all of the neurodevelopmental disorders, which have increased 20-30 times in the last 50 years. A child with ASD requires regular monitoring, care, and support. But, the existing social-cultural-financial constraints and the scarcity of mental health care practitioners have deprived the families raising children with ASD in low-and middle-income countries (LMICs) like Bangladesh. However, the recent overwhelming adoption (~80%) of mobile phones has created an opportunity to improve the existing practice of care using affordable mobile applications. mCARE, a mobile-based care system, has been developed to reduce the gap between families raising a child with ASD and psychologists with the help of the latest technology using a remote Experience Sampling Method (ESM). In the system, behavioral and developmental parameters of the patients are collected regularly. Three tools: mCARE-APP, mCARE-SMS, and mCARE-DMP, have been designed and implemented for the mCARE system. All of these allow caregivers to report routinely and systematically and thus build the personal records of behavioral progress for each child with ASD. Thus the system will definitely help psychiatrists and psychologists improve and expedite the decision-making process by viewing appropriate visualization tools along with different kinds of reporting to summarize this information.