Hello Trevor,
Its the old "Supermarket vs Corner Shop" argument again, isn't it.
We have a wonderful hospital system, developed in house by an (ex) clinical
biochemist, using the same basic commercial database (4D) as the lab system
(also an in house development). Crucial to its success is its
responsiveness to users' feedback, whether these are nuses logging
dependence scores, records booking OP clinics or Biochemistry wanting the
flexibility of long winded comments for complex metabolic diagnoses. All
this was achieved with a LAN of PCs and Macs at a fraction of the cost of a
commercial system.
The downs - we are a small hospital site; for continued development the
system depends on the in-house staff; and it therefore is not widely
transferable without introducing some of the inflexibility of off the peg
systems.
I know which I would rather have.
Regards
Dr Jean Kirk
Paediatric Biochemistry
Royal Hospital for Sick Children, Edinburgh
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