Seventeen Year Experience of a Computerized Microbiology Laboratory Information System

Abstract

At the beginning of 1970, a modest computer based hospital information system (HIS) was built in the University Central Hospital of Tampere (UCHT). The 13A0-bed hospital has about 40000 inpatients and 150000 outpatients a year. Basic information on every patient, including the outpatients, was recorded in the HIS. The including discharge data on every patient. This information provided the central core of a regional data base developed later for all inpatients in the different hospitals in this region of 420000 inhabitants. For all the inpatients a laboratory test request and results reporting system was developed using pre-identified port-a-punch cards. There were different cards for clinical chemistry, hematology, physiology and one card for bacteriological tests.