Læknablaðið - 15.03.1983, Blaðsíða 40

88
LÆKNABLADID
Brekkan, Á
Chief, Department of Radiology,
City Hospital, Reykjavík
108 Reykjavík, ICELAND.
THE USE OF COMPUTERIZED
INFORMATION IN THE ACTIVITIES OF
RADIOLOGICAL DEPARTMENTS
Review of methods, techniques and applica-
tion in registering, storing and processing data.
SUMMARY
Chapter 1: Preface
The Department of Radiology was the first unit to
be established in a new building in 1966. This
monograph deals mainly with the basis for informa-
tion gathering at the Department, the objectives set,
the programming and some examples are given of
possible uses of the system in the fields of epidemio-
logy and management. Following an introduction in
Chapter 2 the material is dealt with in three parts:
1. Chapter 3 is a presentation and discussion of
information systems and systems analysis and Chap-
ter 4 is a discourse on the application of general
principles of information systems analysis and Shan-
non’s statistical information theory to the Roentgen
diagnostic process.
2. A description is given of the elementary
statistical data considered necessary in the design of
the registration system and Chapter 6 deals with the
registration system and diagnostic code, construc-
tion and use.
3. Finally in Chapter 7 a summary is given of a
number of publications and projects based on the
computer-stored information of the Radiological
Department of the City Hospital, Reykjavík.
Chapter 2: Introduction
The ever increasing amount of information added to
all sectors of health services, together with the
continuing rise of expenditure within this field of
society, has necessitated a more rational and sophi-
sticated approach to the economic handling and use
of such information. This has universally been the
case and thus the basis for the introduction of the
terminology and approaches of systems analysis to
what may be classified as the health information
system. This evolution, already started at the incep-
tion of the work described in this report, has
progressed rapidly and universally. Now, systems
approach to and electronic dataprocessing of infor-
mation from various sectors of the health services is
being effected, both on a local and national basis in
this country.
One of the elementaries in the design of the
radiological datacollecting and the analyses de-
scribed here, was the introduction of a useful
individual identification system. This was made,
having the ultimate goal of a computer-stored
medical-data- information system (databank) in
mind. The report may thus be considered as one link
in the documentation-chain of experience in appli-
cation of dataprocessing within the health system in
Iceland, to one sector, namely, the management of
af radiological department.
(Literature references in this chapter: 1-28).
Chapter 3: Information System and Systems
Analysis
In this chapter the basic concepts of information
systems and systems analysis are presented and
discussed: as a result of the central position of
computer-use in the efforts to cope with increased
amounts of usable information, methods and con-
cepts of »systems approach«, »systems analysis«
have become tools in the organization, evaluation
and management of the health-services and indivi-
dual fractions thereof. The fundamental prerequisite
for this is the understanding of the logical arrange-
ment of relevant components of information and
events into integrated informations systems. It is
pointed out that this is not alltogether a new
approach as the same logic lies behind many
philosophical systems of old. Frequently this sy-
stems-arrangement of information is necessitated
by the clear and unambugious semantics required
for the construction of programmes and other »soft-
ware« for computer-processing. In other cases,
advances in technical and managerial sciences have
generated new technical or management concepts
and problems requiring a fresh approach. Generally,
all components of human and societal efforts may
be logically arranged into information systems,
where groups of events, information, reaction and
activities are linked together into a more or less
integrated operational system (cybernetic system).
Within this system, again, changes in the nature and
character of individual components influence all
other components, and also have a varying impact
outside the systém.
The fundamentals of ecological systems are
discussed, and the analogies between such systems
and systems of behavior within sectors of human
society and organizations mentioned. It is especially
stressed, that information systems of the human
society are in one fundamental aspect different from
nature’s own, and that is in their adaptive nature,
which relates to the fact that the values of informa-
tion and feedback within the system or out of it are
generally less precise and more prone to variation
in the process of systems analysis, than the biologi-
cally more clearcut pieces of information in nature’s
ecological systems.
In the evaluation of information, available for
decisions, as a result of analysis of societal informa-
tion systems, this drawback must always be serious-
ly considered. In the health services, as in other
parts of society, there is a tendency to overrate