Speaker
Mr
Charlie Clark
Description
Computers are well-suited for routine, recurring tasks such as data entry.
In fields such as medicine effective use can lead to considerable
improvements in productivity and patient care if doctors spend less time
asking routine questions. As part of a research project at the University
of Aberdeen I have been investigating possible systems. Any system should
require as little maintenance by programmers as possible and should be
configurable by managers, although the data captured would only be required
for a doctor-patient interview, it should be stored in a reusable form.
While there are several very questionnaire systems around they are
generally geared towards statistical evaluation. Furthermore, while
providing a great deal of flexibility in questionnaire and report layout,
the data essentially remains locked within the application. It was decided
to develop a prototype to support a generic, data-driven approach with a
RDBMS backend for connection with other systems.
To provide the greatest degree of flexibility the core part of the
application requires very little programming. Zope, Python and PostgreSQL
provide a good environment for this kind of requirement: PostgreSQL ensures
data integrity, Python is well-suited for writing business rules, Zope is
an excellent environment for integration. As a result most problems are of
a conceptional nature. Due to the highly specific nature of parts of the
project, it is unlikely that the software will be released.
Primary author
Mr
Charlie Clark
