Supporting Physicians by RE4S: Evaluating Requirements Engineering for Sustainability in the Medical Domain

Sustainable development applied to software engineering means developing systems in a sustainable way (domain-independent), as well as supporting sustainability in the application domain (domain-dependent). Developing sustainable software begins with requirements engineering (RE). RE for sustainability (RE4S) outlines the process of RE while taking steps to make the system more sustainable. This approach answers the question, "What should this software system do, while contributing to overall sustainability?" This paper considers how sustainability impacts the requirements engineering process for a software system for medication adherence. The examined system, Project Cognatio, is targeted toward outpatient medical practices with the goal to improve medication adherence among patients. We found considering the dimensions of sustainability can significantly enrich a number of RE artifacts and thereby inform system\´s design. This analysis proves useful for the future development of Project Cognatio and shows that RE4S can improve software development\´s contribution to sustainability.