Computerization of Patient Data Management for Vology by Automatic Coding System : A Program Using dBASE IV in Personal Computer

Choo, Myung Soo; Choi, Hwang

Abstract

In recent years there are so many medical informations that urologists should know. Computer systems offer new opportunities for the storage and manipulation of hospital informations. A computer-based system for urologic patient data management has been designed and developed by the authors. This program was written in dBASE IV language and could be used in IBM PC/AT (16 Bit) with at least 20MB hard disk drive. The main features of this program include storage and retrieval of data easily by pull-down menus using automatic coding system for diagnoses and operation names. Searching a case or a group of cases could be performed by name, chart number and filters (date of input, diagnosis code, operation code, urology number). And they are easily printed out by two different print forms. The automatic coding system is that after diagnoses and operation named are typed, their codes are automatically registered. The urologic code system for automatic coding was also designed by the authors. In our experience this computer-based urologic patient data management system by automatic coding is very useful, easy to handle, and minimizing input errors.