This website provides an overview of the software processing of medical data, with an emphasis on the traps that are often present.
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Healthcare Data QA
This website provides an overview of the software processing of medical data, with an emphasis on the traps that are often present. |
| Home Introduction Software Design Basic Obstacles Data Input Problems Human Obstacles EHR DataBases CSV Files XML Files Reports Statistics Legal Other © 2022 Kevin Pardo | Basic Obstacles to SuccessThe biggest obstacles to processing data are simple, but are unfortunately unlikely to diminish over time.Receiving Data at the Promised Intervals: A constant problem is that client organizations fail to make data available at the intervals promised. There can be many causes, from server outages to changes in upstream data tags. Unfortunately, chunks of data will fail each month. Rarely will anyone warn you that data will be altered or that it will be stale. Problems will not decrease with time. Accessing Structured and Clean Data: In many cases, it feels as if you
have been given access to a junkyard, not an engineered data environment. There are multiple,
ambiguous sources for core data and carefully design data stores have been abandoned.
Some clear and well-structured data sources have never been used by the client.
Identifiers are inconsistent. For example, inpatient and outpatient data may exist in parallel
data stores, but the domain (inpatient, outpatient) may not be clear when first learning a database.
Effort will be required to navigate the data the client gives you.
Stable Data: In addition to minor data and access changes each month, every few years a data source is likely to have major, destabilizing updates. Software vendors push major changes on their client organizations continuously. This means that much of your work for version 4 of an EHR will have to be discarded when your clinics and hospitals migrate to v5. A lot of time each year will go to redoing the discovery, validation, and harvesting of "completed" parts of the project. Don't expect anyone to ask for your consent before the old EHR is shutdown and a new one brought up. You will have to drop everything, often with little warning. The basic coding systems change as well. Between 2022 and 2027, the US will tentatively migrate diagnosis codes from ICD-10 to ICD-11. In the past, the deadlines have been extended. Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICD-11 Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. - The Red Queen |