 What
are some of the
important benefits that
Mountain View Community
Hospital should seek in using
databases? As much as
possible, relate your response
to the hospital environment.

It is important for every company to
have a storeroom of data that is
allowable to be accessed by authorized
employees or even by customers on a
limited basis. Hospitals are divided into
several departments and a lot of
information such as patient details,
doctor’s schedule, room occupants and
so forth are to be shared.

Since the Mountain View Hospital has
applications including Patient Care
Administration, Clinical Services,
Financial Management and
Administrative Service and are linked
through a client- server technology,
their database (Departmental
Database) is suited to their needs and
capabilities.

It is only the matter of proper
implementation and standards that
has to be developed and changed.
The data acquired on databases
among different applications shall be
reliable and coherent so that there will
be consistency on the information
gained among patient name, patient
number, patient address, etc.
What
are some of the
costs and risks of using
databases that the
hospital must manage
carefully?

They should take precaution on loss of
data integrity since the hospital
implements and has applications
purchased from outside vendors,
there is a need to hire and train
personnel to design and to implement
their database so that there would be
less data inconsistency and
duplication.
 They
should also cope with the
cost, management and
maintenance of database, given
that there is a need to keep up
and update the data their
handling particularly among their
patient’s information and
patient’s charges.
 Along
with the management, the
hospital should also have explicit
backup and recovery. Because
when damage and environment
catastrophe happen the
database should be secured and
recovered.
 At
present, Mountain View
Community Hospital is using relational
database technology. Although this
technology is appropriate for
structured data such as patient or
accounting data, it is less well suited
to unstructured data such as
graphical data and images.
 Can
you think of some types of
data maintained by a hospital
that fit this latter category? What
types of database technology
might be better suited to these
data types rather than relational?
 Hospitals
keep records such as list
of patients, patient details and
results, room occupations and
assigned doctors that are
dynamic, meaning, it changes
constantly and requires to be
updated as often as every day.
 It
would be very efficient for
Mountain View Community
Hospital to consider using
operational database.
Operational database
technology is designed to keep
data that needs to be collected
and modified on a daily basis.
 How
are data in the PATIENT and
PATIENT CHARGES table related?
That is, how can a user find the
relevant charges for a particular
patient?

The PATIENT and PATIENT CHARGES
shares the PATIENT NUMBER attribute. The
patient number serves as the reference
for the PATIENT TABLE. The charges
incurred by the patient is referred to the
patient through the patient number.
What
are some ways the
hospital could use the
internet?

Mountain View Community Hospital,
though it is a small and not-for-profit, it is
advisable for them to make use of
internet as much as other hospitals do.
Online Inquiry, hospital departments’
contact numbers, list of doctors and their
specializations are few of those that the
hospital could provide through the
internet.
 Give
an example of how the
hospital could use each of the
types of databases described
in the chapter: personal,
workgroup, departmental,
enterprise, and internet.
 Personal
databases can be used
for keeping the patients’
records(names, diagnoses and
more), Workgroups for the
medical team that will be
conducting surgeries, and other
duties than need collaboration.
 Department
databases for the
workers, employees and
professional records and
Enterprise databases are used to
check the total activities and
business operations at the facility.
Database
Patient
Charges
Patient
Patient
Name
Patient
Address
Patient
Number
Item
Description
Amount
Item Code
Name
Type
Length
Description
Name
Alphanumeric
30
Patient Name
ID
Integer
10
Patient Number
Address
Alphanumeric
40
Patient Address
Code
Integer
15
Item Code
Description
Alphanumeric
30
Item Description
Amount
Integer
6
Amount of Item
Patient Name: Dolan, Mark
Patient Number: 4238
Patient Address: 818 River Run
Item Code
200
275
700
Item Description
Room Semi-Private
Radiology
EEG Test
Amount
1600
150
200
Hospital
Ward
Employee
Physician
Patient
Charge