Explorations in the Design and Implementation of Clinical Information Systems
Marc Andreessen, of Netscape and Mosaic fame, and current uber venture capitalist, wrote a fascinating essay last year in the Wall Street Journal. In Why Software is Eating the World, he makes the case that software-based companies are gradually assuming a dominant position in the economy. Andreessen offers the following as the basis for this [...]
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Dealing with abnormal test results was one of the main misery points during my years in practice. It was too easy for things to fall through the cracks. When clinicians receive an abnormal result, the usual steps are: review the patient’s chart, decide what to do, and take action. Proper management may require additional tests, [...]
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For the last few weeks or so, I have taken time from other activities in order to take a fresh look at EHR design. This was not on my to-do list. It came about because of my interest in how usability, workflow, and other design issues affect implementation success. EHR implementation is a source of [...]
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Since the initiation of the NIST EHR usability program, I have noticed a range of reactions to its supposed intent. Everything from “the federal government should not dictate EHR design” to “it’s about time someone did something about EHR usability.” It appears that much of the discrepancy in opinion may be due to the varying [...]
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When creating the EHR at UAB, I spent months working on the data model. Much of that effort went into making sure that the data captured would be suitable for outcomes research. Of course, the data model can only do so much to ensure data quality–what users choose to enter also plays a role. Anyone [...]
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The desire to understand modern software development best practices is the impetus behind my study of software architecture and design. Fortunately, there are many good books on the topic. Primarily, I have been using: Software Architecture in Practice, Second Edition and Microsoft Application Architecture, Second Edition (1). The former is recommended by the Software Engineering [...]
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I have just finished rereading the NIST Draft EHR Usability Protocol (EUP). I am even more impressed with its quality now that I have a new software project underway. When developing software, creating an actionable set of requirements is difficult. Working with users only solves part of the problem because naïve users (those who have [...]
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As I mentioned in the last post, I am making good progress toward learning object-oriented development methods. During the holiday break, I created a small web project to test my understanding so far. The results were encouraging, convincing me to promote my programming activities from a hobby to a real business pursuit. Likewise, mastering the [...]
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A few posts back, I described how the flexibility offered by content management systems made them superior to traditional methods for building websites. Content management systems such as WordPress (used for building this site) are designed in a way that allows new capabilities to be added to sites quickly and easily. The appearance of a [...]
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The EHR Science Blog presents the musings of Jerome H. Carter, MD, CEO of NTM Informatics, Inc. He is also the editor of Electronic Health Records, Second Edition, published by the American College of Physicians.
Posts on this blog are the personal views of Dr. Carter and do not reflect the official policies or positions of the American College of Physicians.