USE OF A COMPUTERIZED INFORMATION-SYSTEM FOR PRIMARY-CARE

OBJECTIVE To develop and implement a computerized version of the Inter national Classification of Primary Care. To create a data bank and to conduct a descriptive study of our clinic's clientele. DESIGN Testing a software program and creating a data bank. SETTING Family Medicine U nit at Enfant-Jesus Hospital Quebec City. PARTICIPANTS All Family Medi cine Unit doctors and patients seen between July 1, 1990, and June 30, 1993. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE Description of our clientele's health prob lems using the ICPC. RESULTS During the study, 48415 diagnostic codes for 33033 visits were entered into the bank. For close to 50% of these visits, two or more health problems were coded. There was good correl ation between the description of our clientele and descriptions in oth er studies in the literature. CONCLUSION This article describes the de velopment of a data bank in a family medicine unit using a software pr ogram based on the ICPC. Our 3-year experiment demonstrated that the m ethod works well in family physicians' daily practice. A descriptive s tudy of our clientele is presented, as well as a few examples of the m any applications of such a data bank.