Interactive health care system and method

An interactive health care system for a patient located at a patient site and under the care of a health care provider located at a health care provider site physically separated from the patient site, the interactive health care system providing for patient participation in the patient's health care, the system comprising:

• at least one patient operated sensor for obtaining measurement of a patient's physiological parameters;
• means for converting each measurement into an indexed data record;
• a patient site data processing unit for sorting and processing said indexed data records;
• an associated patient site database which stores said indexed data records;
• an instruction set for said patient site data processing unit for enabling said patient site data processing unit to selectively perform a SPC analysis on said indexed data records, said SPC analysis including the establishment of an XmR control chart having calculated process control limits, a calculated process center line, and a calculated upper limit of the moving range, and to test whether the conditions of one or more of the following rules are met,
• 1. one or more variable values corresponding to said measurements are outside said process control limits,
• 2. eight or more consecutive variable values are on one side of said process center line,
• 3. three out of four consecutive variable values are closer to one of said control limits than they are to said process center line, or
• 4. one or more moving range values defined as the difference between subsequent variable values are above said upper limit of the moving range;
• and
• means for notifying the patient when one or more of the above four rules of detection are met.