IDEF3-Based Framework for Web-Based Hospital Information System

Abstract

This chapter presents a framework for a Web-based hospital information system to manage the surgery-management process (SMP). The framework can be used to manage any other hospital information system processes. The developed framework challenges the traditional hospital Web strategies with a dual aim: first, to improve customer satisfaction in an environment that often imposes unexplained deviation from planned activities, and second, to create a system that is an effective decision-support system for SMP. The chapter identifies factors affecting SMP decisions and employs a descriptive modeling technique known as IDEF3 to map the information flow within and between elements of SMP. The IDEF3 process mapping becomes part of an integrated Web-based system of multiple stages. Each stage has three levels of accessibility. The first level of the Web system is accessible to the public, the second level is accessible to patients and their designated representatives, and the third level is accessible only to hospital professionals.