WEBIFYING A PATIENT INTERVIEW SUPPORT APPLICATION

This paper reports on the software engineering challenges, and resulta nt benefits experienced, in porting an interactive, knowledge-based sy stem from Microsoft Windows to the World Wide Web for evaluation purpo ses. The Patient Interview Support Application (PISA) is a program int ended for operation by a non-expert clerk to interview an ambulatory p rimary care patient. The PISA code had to be re-written substantially to address the 'connectionless' nature of Web dialog and to work in te rms of dynamically generated HTML forms; however, it was possible to a void any revision of the central knowledge-base or inference engine. T he resultant Web environment attracted thought-provoking and detailed feedback from users, indicating that significant attention can be obta ined from the global community by mounting an interactive system on th e Web. Specific enhancements to the PISA's artificial intelligence are suggested by user reaction. A future global health informatics 'marke tplace' with a multitude of Web-based system components available for composition of health information systems is envisioned.