Good Entropy

In the comments to
The Data Model That Nearly Killed Me

Alexander Scarlat MD
April 18, 2009

“Data modeling is not optional” (Data Modeling Essentials by Simsion & Witt)

Great article and a correct diagnosis of one of the main problems of the Healthcare Informatics industry.
I am a physician with a degree in computer sciences currently employed as Chief Medical Informatics Officer with a medium sized hospital in the USA. We are now in the process of setting up a clinical data repository to store and present the users with laboratory results, imaging links and pharmacy orders on top of the diagnosis and procedures. I found out repeatedly that vendors are not willing to share the database schema of their products with the excuse it is a proprietary document. Unfortunately, many times this is just an excuse for a complete lack of such a schema. Even worse -the conceptual diagram, logical and physical data model is either non existent, poorly defined or kept in someone’s vault. The analogy that comes to mind is trying to build a house without a blueprint or with one that is kept in the builder’s vault.
I strongly recommend anyone in the HIT industry to read the book I have quoted above. I have no doubt it will save millions of $, mountains of users ‘ frustrations and most probably a couple of lives.