title: Integrated computerized databases for medical data management beyond the bedside.
abstract: Computers are beginning to be utilized extensively for direct patient care, assisting nursing and medical staff with data collection and review at the bedside. However, most clinical data management systems are optimized for bedside patient care and offer limited resources for multi-patient data analysis. At Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, a network of computer systems has been developed to provide linkages between clinical, administrative and outcome data for Surgical Intensive Care Unit (SICU) patients. Increasingly, such data is needed to evaluate the relationship between severity of illness and patient outcome and the utilization of expensive critical care resources. Over the parts 3 years, comprehensive data on 6,755 consecutive SICU patients receiving 18,394 days of care have been accumulated by our PDMS. Using linkages constructed to other hospital systems and databases, trends for severity of illness, severity adjusted survival, census, bed utilization, nursing utilization and many other parameters have been constructed. These linkages are valuable in documenting cost-effective and medically-effective patient care practices.
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California.
authors.forename: B J
authors.initials: BJ
authors.lastname: Leyerle
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: LoBue
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Shabot
mesh_terms: D003195:Computer Communication Networks; D003199:Computer Systems; D006751:Hospital Information Systems; D007362:Intensive Care Units / Q000458:organization & administration*; D015141:Los Angeles; D008838:Microcomputers; D010562:Personnel Staffing and Scheduling Information Systems; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D012984:Software; D016019:Survival Analysis