The Data Warehouse of Soon Hyang University Hospital - Case Study Example

The Soon Hyang Hospital had to reduce the times required for admissions, the processing of test results for patients, and transferring patients’ diagnosis or treatment at different places so that it could be more proficient. Situation and solution previously, all the four sites that the hospital operates in had employed the use of different information technology systems that included electronic medical records system, e-payment systems as well as picture archiving and communications systems which are used in the management of imaging data from MRIs and computed tomography scanning systems.

This meant that when patients had to be transferred from one hospital site to another, they were required to carry all their relevant medical records and data with them and the information had to be manually entered into the electronic system that was operated by the hospital. A lot of time and money was wasted through this process and since the hospital sites were not in a position to share histories of patients easily, they were forced to diagnose patients more than once, therefore, doubling some costs.

The Integrated Medical Information System project was founded to deal with these issues that we're reducing the efficiency of the hospital. It was meant to phase out the information stores that existed at all of the four sites the hospital operated through coming up with a central source of patient information that was referred to as a data warehouse.BenefitsThe data warehouse entails storage systems for patient’s records along with PACS data for each site that the hospital operates while having a backup that is off the site to protect the records of the patients.

The system transmits the patient’s data between the different sites through a secured private network which ensured that there is regulatory compliance together with integrity as only the employees who are authorized may be able to access it. The different sites of the hospital can simply access the warehouse through a web browser making access to information easy and fast thus reducing the time that is needed to attend to patients. This also eliminates the situations where the hospital had to diagnose patients more than once when they could not share records easily.

The data warehouse has also significantly improved the processing of imaging data particularly reducing the time that is needed to share imaging information between different hospital departments by almost ninety-five percent. It has made all the imaging data digital making it safer since the physical copies were easily misplaced or misfiled. Potential disadvantages The advantages associated with the data warehouse that the hospital operates outweigh the potential disadvantages that may be associated with it.

With its initial implementation, the hospital had to conduct fresh training in filing for all its staff since the new system was overhauling the previous one. Since the system utilizes a network to transmit data from one site to another and all the data is stored at one place, situations, when the network is congested or fails, might cripple some of the operation of the hospital since access to the files and records will be impossible. Cases, where a person that is not authorized to access the warehouse gets the required codes and accesses, might also lead to the data and records being compromised.