Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Foreword
- Foreword
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Audit: historical and future perspectives
- 3 Audit philosophy
- 4 Medical audit: a view from the centre
- 5 Audit: a view from the Royal College of Surgeons of England
- 6 The regional viewpoint
- 7 Medical audit: the needs of the District Health Authorities
- 8 Resource management and budget holding
- 9 Unit and district information systems
- 10 Read codes and medical audit
- 11 Data capture direct from doctors
- 12 Computer systems: practice, limitations and pitfalls
- 13 Paediatric audit
- 14 Audit in obstetrics and gynaecology
- 15 Audit in general surgery
- 16 Orthopaedic audit: guidelines and hints
- 17 Installing audit in general practice and general dental practice
- 18 Clinical audit in psychiatry. Models for audit in mental health
- 19 Audit in anaesthesia
- 20 Audit in intensive care
- 21 Medical audit: lessons from the USA
- 22 Quality control in health care: the Dutch experience
- 23 Medical audit: experience from Sweden
- 24 Performance indicators
- 25 Measuring outcome and quality control
- 26 Audit: will it work?
- 27 What has been achieved so far?
- 28 A practical guide to audit
- Index
9 - Unit and district information systems
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 September 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Foreword
- Foreword
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Audit: historical and future perspectives
- 3 Audit philosophy
- 4 Medical audit: a view from the centre
- 5 Audit: a view from the Royal College of Surgeons of England
- 6 The regional viewpoint
- 7 Medical audit: the needs of the District Health Authorities
- 8 Resource management and budget holding
- 9 Unit and district information systems
- 10 Read codes and medical audit
- 11 Data capture direct from doctors
- 12 Computer systems: practice, limitations and pitfalls
- 13 Paediatric audit
- 14 Audit in obstetrics and gynaecology
- 15 Audit in general surgery
- 16 Orthopaedic audit: guidelines and hints
- 17 Installing audit in general practice and general dental practice
- 18 Clinical audit in psychiatry. Models for audit in mental health
- 19 Audit in anaesthesia
- 20 Audit in intensive care
- 21 Medical audit: lessons from the USA
- 22 Quality control in health care: the Dutch experience
- 23 Medical audit: experience from Sweden
- 24 Performance indicators
- 25 Measuring outcome and quality control
- 26 Audit: will it work?
- 27 What has been achieved so far?
- 28 A practical guide to audit
- Index
Summary
Information systems for units and districts, are, in the terms of their functions, two different things. However, when looked at as a collection of data, they are only different aspects of a coherent interlocking of a number of systems, which deal with the same common set of data items. It is proposed therefore, in this chapter to discuss these two concepts as one, only defining a difference when this arises from a difference in use.
Information technology and its practical implementation is the ‘art of the realisable’. The question is not ‘can it be done?’, but ‘can it be done in good time without disproportionate cost?’. Current technology will allow complicated and extensive systems capable of serving any function or answering any question that an enthusiastic project board could conceive; however, most project boards work under constraints, of money if nothing else, so that systems as they are designed are a compromise in one or more aspects, e.g. functionality, performance, extent of implementation, etc.
Most systems are in existence as a response to a problem. They were not designed to solve that problem, they were retained for this purpose. The usual situation is that existing systems solved the last problem and have been adapted to deal with the present problems; with any luck they will do for the next set of problems.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Medical Audit , pp. 109 - 124Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1993