EBUS
Electronic diagnostic findings system
Within the EBUS project FORWISS Passau develops in cooperation with the Passau General Hospital an electronic diagnosis system. Originally conceptuated for the gastroenterology it is meanwhile in field operation in other clinical departments such as the orthopedics and the neurology.
EBUS—a follow up project to EPAK—is a software system to automatically generate diagnostic findings. It is by far more flexible than the older EPAK system, because it comes along with an application for diagnosis catalog design by the end user.
The diagnosis catalog as a core concept of EBUS resembles a certain examination: gastroscopy, coloscopy etc. It has a tree structure with examination complexes on its branches and diagnostic details on its leafes. The catalog defines a large questionnaire that can be filled in using the computer. When designing a catalog medical and legal standards should be realized leading to quality assurance in the field of medical examinations.
While examining a patient, the diagnostic information generated according to the catalog specification is displayed in a text window and shot photos are shown in an image gallery. Arbitrary free text can be added to the findings. The dynamic layout of the user interface guarantees that the windows keep clearly arranged. Fast access to former findings is implemented as well as data exchange from EBUS with the clinical information system in use by the hospital management.
EBUS offers the medic by its determined separation of the tasks of doctor and nurse the possibility to concentrate on the medical aspects of a certain examination. Due to the fast creation of the findings they can leave the examination room at the same time the patient does.
Because of the almost unlimited options for drawing statistics from the data the doctor can analyse them to create anything from daily protocols to medical long term studies.
EBUS has been in field operation since november 1999 at Passau General Hospital within the endoscopy. Due to the good experiences there, EBUS has been expanded to become tailored for multiple clients. Since 2002 it is in use in other departments for daily work, too.