Secure Tropos: An Agent Oriented Software Engineering Methodology for the Development of Health and Social Care Information Systems

A huge amount of health and social care related information needs to be stored and analysed; with the aid of computer systems this can be done faster and more efficiently. As a result, computerised health and social care information systems are gaining popularity. The development of such systems, mostly so far, follows an ad-hoc pattern. However, in order to effectively deal with the characteristics of such systems such as size, security, unpredictability, and openness; appropriate software engineering methodologies and paradigms should be employed for their development. This paper defines a set of requirements that a methodology should demonstrate and it argues for the appropriateness of the Secure Tropos agent oriented methodology for the development of health and social care information systems. The applicability of the methodology is demonstrated with the aid of a real-life case study, the electronic Single Assessment Process system, an information system to support integrated assessment of the health and social care needs of older people. The application of the proposed methodology on the case study indicated that the methodology satisfies the identified requirements.

Citation:
Mouratidis, H. (2009) ‘Secure Tropos: An Agent Oriented Software Engineering Methodology for the Development of Health and Social Care Information Systems’, International Journal of Computer Science and Security, 3 (3) 241-271.