The HELP hospital information system: update 1998

The HELP hospital information system has been operational at LDS Hospital s ince 1967. The system initially supported a heart catheterization laborator y and a post open heart Intensive Care Unit. Since the initial installation the system has been expanded to become an integrated hospital information system providing services with sophisticated clinical decision-support capa bilities to a wide variety of clinical areas such as laboratory, nurse char ting, radiology, pharmacy, etc. The HELP system is currently operational in multiple hospitals of LDS Hospitals parent health care enterprise-Intermou ntain Health Care (IHC). The HELP system has also been integrated into the daily operations of several other hospitals in addition to those at IHC. Ev aluations of the system have shown: (1) it to be widely accepted by clinica l staff; (2) computerized clinical decision-support is feasible; (3) the sy stem provides improvements in patient care; and (4) the system has aided in providing more cost-effective patient care. Plans for making the transitio n from the 'function rich' HELP system to more modern hardware and software platforms are also discussed. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd. All r ights reserved.