ORCA: The versatile CPR

The introduction of computer-based patient records (CPRs) that fully replac e paper records proves especially difficult in specialized care, despite th e potential advantages of CPRs for patient care and research. Improved data legibility, availability, sharing of records, and decision support may dir ectly benefit patient care. Barriers to the introduction of CPR application s at institutions may be caused by lack of infrastructure, or by financial or organizational issues. To have clinicians interactively enter data at th e point of care is still a big challenge. This paper presents an overview o f ORCA (Open Record of CAre): a generic CPR, designed for integration with existing systems, presentation of multi-media patient data, and the collect ion of structured data, directly by clinicians. ORCA can easily be tailored to the needs of a variety of medical specialists without the need for chan ges to its data model, functionality, or interface. The paper describes the essence of the architecture of ORCA and the user benefits with emphasis on the support of structured data entry.