Integration of all information sources in a clinical environment

Abstract

If evidence-based medicine (EBM) is to become fully integrated with patient care then we believe it essential that reference sources must be readily available at the point of healthcare delivery and be seamlessly integrated with access to the medical record. We have employed a user-centred design approach to develop a prototype ward-based clinical workstation, which uses Web technology to provide consistency of both user and data interfaces. Two sources of information are required for our work: the first is an Electronic Patient Record (EPR); the second is the reference material. As a first stage towards a clinical workstation to support EBM, the most commonly required sources of reference material were identified using semi-structured interviews. A first prototype system to evaluate the potential for a workstation to support EBM was constructed by developing a Web-based interface to the hospital's laboratory Results Reporting System (RRS). Links between this and the most commonly used reference sources identified in the semi-structured interviews were established. An evaluation of this prototype suggested a high acceptability of both the user interface and of the concept of a clinical workstation which allows access to both patient specific and reference data.