Barriers integrating dedicated software for quality management in pain centres.
OBJECTIVE
Explore the feasibility of integrating a dedicated pain centre information system as part of a quality management network with a number of different Hospital Information Systems.


METHODS
A systematic approach integrating and implementing the system in 15 selected hospital organisations (a nationwide 15% non-random sample).


RESULTS
Hospitals have widely varying policies on integration and implementation of additional clinically required 3rd party software. Financial and organisational constraints are considerable. Partial data integration could be realised in one third of the hospital organisations within the project timeframe. Linking with various types of Hospital Information Systems from the same or different vendors caused no technical difficulties. The total effort required, however, varies considerably; different versions of a HIS of the same vendor require substantial additional effort. IT departments hardly use standard rules to accept this type of systems, causing substantial increases in completion time for installation.


CONCLUSIONS
Although it is feasible to integrate a local departmental system as required (download of general patient, provider and referrer data basically, and also upload of certain data) the workload of scaling to the national level is considered far beyond what is reasonable for a national quality management network for pain. Alternatives for recording and capturing data (which comply with the requirements of the national system) are currently being explored.
Ten Hoopen
A Johannes
AJ
Medical Informatics, Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre, The Netherlands. A.J.tenHoppen@mi.umcn.nl
Zanstra
Pieter E
PE
Van der Haring
Egbert J
EJ
Tuil
Wouter S
WS
Van Wijhe
Marten
M
D004059:Diffusion of Innovation; D005240:Feasibility Studies; D006751:Hospital Information Systems; D006801:Humans; D009426:Netherlands; D018710:Pain Clinics; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care; D012984:Software