Physician programmer with enhanced graphical user interface, and associated systems and methods

1. A system to facilitate patient treatment, the system comprising:

a non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions for a server of implantable medical device data, wherein the instructions, when executed by the server, cause the server to:

receive the implantable medical device data for multiple implantable medical devices associated with corresponding multiple patients, the implantable medical device data including patient characteristics and patient symptoms, the characteristics including medication taken by individual patients of the multiple patients, wherein corresponding individual implantable medical devices include:

an implantable signal generator, and

an elongated signal delivery lead attachable to the implantable signal generator and positionable proximate to a corresponding individual patient's spinal cord;

receive ratings for modulation programs executed by the implantable medical devices, with individual modulation programs including parameters for generating a signal via a corresponding individual implantable medical device, the parameters including a frequency, a duty cycle, and an amplitude, the signal being directed to contacts of the elongated signal delivery lead corresponding to the individual implantable medical device;

receive a recommendation request for a modulation program suitable for a particular patient;

rank the modulation programs based at least in part on (a) the received ratings and (b) the medication taken by the individual patients of the multiple patients matching medication taken by the particular patient; and

transmit one or more of the ranked modulation programs in response to the request for a modulation program for the particular patient.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the ratings for the modulation programs correspond to levels of pain experienced by the individual patients while using the implantable medical devices, wherein the ratings are inversely correlated with a level of patient pain.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein the instructions further cause the server to host a webpage that provides a graphical interface of the ratings for each modulation program, the graphical interface presenting statistical relationships between the modulation programs and levels of pain experienced by the individual patients.

4. The system of claim 3 wherein the graphical interface further displays statistical relationships between the modulation programs, levels of pain experienced by the individual patients, and locations of sources of pain for the individual patients.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein the signal is delivered to one pair of contacts from the elongated signal delivery lead.

6. The system of claim 1 wherein the symptoms include a level of pain and a location of pain.

7. The system of claim 1 wherein the received ratings for the modulation programs are received from multiple computing devices, with a computing device of one of the multiple computing devices being one of an implantable medical device programmer used by a physician, a cellular telephone used by an individual patient, or an implantable medical device controller used by the individual patient.

8. The system of claim 1 wherein the patient symptoms include at least one of a level of pain or a location of pain of the individual patients, and wherein ranking the modulation programs is further based on at least one of the symptoms described by the individual patients matching one or more symptoms of the particular patient.

9. The system of claim 1 wherein the patient characteristics further include at least one of an age, a weight, or a height of the individual patients, and wherein ranking the modulation programs is further based at least in part on at least one of the age, the weight, or the height of the individual patients matching one or more of the age, the weight, or the height of the particular patient.

10. The system of claim 1 wherein the patient characteristics further include an activity level of the individual patients, and wherein ranking the modulation programs is further based at least in part on the activity level of the individual patients matching an activity level of the particular patient.

11. The system of claim 1 , further comprising:

a particular implantable signal generator associated with the particular patient, the particular implantable signal generator attachable to one or more implantable elongated signal delivery devices positionable proximate to the particular patient's spinal cord; and

a network interface communicatively coupling the particular implantable signal generator to the server via a network,

wherein, in operation, the particular implantable signal generator delivers an electrical therapy signal to the particular patient based on the one or more transmitted modulation programs.

12. A patient therapy system, comprising:

an implantable signal generator attachable to one or more implantable elongated signal delivery devices that are positionable proximate to a particular patient's spinal cord;

a non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions for establishing a connection with a server storing implantable-signal-generator-executable modulation programs and having implantable medical device data for multiple implantable medical devices associated with corresponding multiple patients, the implantable medical device data including (a) ratings of the modulation programs executed by the implantable medical devices, and (b) patient characteristics and patient symptoms, the characteristics including medication taken by individual patients of the multiple patients; and

a processor coupled to the non-transitory computer-readable medium to execute the instructions to:

request, for the particular patient, a recommendation for at least one of the modulation programs from the server; and

receive one or more of the modulation programs for the particular patient in response to the request, wherein the received modulation program(s) is based at least in part on (a) the ratings of the modulation programs, and (b) the medication taken by the individual patients of the multiple patients matching medication taken by the particular patient.

13. The system of claim 12 wherein the ratings for the modulation programs correspond to levels of pain experienced by the individual patients while using the implantable medical devices, and wherein the ratings are inversely correlated with the level of pain in the individual patient.

14. The system of claim 12 wherein the signal has a frequency, a duty cycle, and a range of amplitudes, and wherein the signal is directed to contacts of an elongated signal delivery lead of the implantable medical devices.

15. The system of claim 12 wherein the symptoms described by the individual patients include a level of pain and a location of pain.

16. The system of claim 12 wherein the ratings of the modulation programs are received from multiple computing devices, and wherein the computing devices include at least one of a medical device programmer used by a physician or a patient programmer used by an individual patient of the other patients.

17. The system of claim 12 , further comprising a network interface communicatively coupling the implantable signal generator to the server via a network.

18. The system of claim 12 wherein the ratings of the modulation programs are efficacy ratings based on the executed modulation programs and received from the individual patients.

19. The system of claim 12 wherein the instructions further cause the implantable signal generator to:

deliver an electrical therapy signal to the particular patient based on the received one or more modulation programs.

20. The system of claim 12 wherein the patient symptoms include at least one of a level of pain and a location of pain of the individual patients, and wherein the received modulation program(s) is further based on at least one of the symptoms of the individual patients matching one or more symptoms of the particular patient.

21. The system of claim 12 wherein the patient characteristics further include at least one of an age, a weight, or a height of the individual patients, and wherein the received modulation program(s) is further based at least in part on at least one of the age, the weight, or the height of the individual patients matching one or more of the age, the weight, or the height of the particular patient.

22. The system of claim 12 wherein the patient characteristics further include the activity level of the individual patients, and wherein the received modulation program(s) is further based at least in part on the activity level of the individual patients matching an activity level of the particular patient.

23. A system to facilitate patient treatment, the system comprising:

a non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions for a server storing implantable medical device data for a group of patients;

wherein the implantable medical device data includes:

patient characteristics of individual patients included within the group of patients, the patient characteristics including medication taken by the individual patients, and

ratings for modulation programs executed by individual implantable medical devices implanted within the individual patients, wherein the modulation programs include parameters for generating a signal via the corresponding individual implantable medical device, and wherein the parameters include a frequency, a duty cycle, and an amplitude;

wherein the instructions, when executed, cause the server to:

receive a request to recommend at least one of the modulation programs for a particular patient,

rank the modulation programs based at least in part on the ratings and based at least in part on the medication taken by the individual matching medication taken by the particular patient, and

transmit one or more of the ranked modulation programs.

24. The system of claim 23 , further comprising:

an implantable signal generator associated with the particular patient, the implantable signal generator attachable to one or more implantable elongated signal delivery devices positionable proximate to the particular patient's spinal cord; and

a network interface communicatively coupling the implantable signal generator to the server via a network,

wherein, in operation, the implantable signal generator delivers an electrical therapy signal to the particular patient based on the one or more transmitted modulation programs.