MEDATA: a new concept in medical records management

The potential applications for computers in expediting medical research and improving patient care are well recognized. However, in a medical environment full exploitation of the latent powers of available electronic devices depends on one vital factor. That is, giving the physicians, research scientists, or administrators direct control of the type of information acquired and stored, how it is related, and the timing of acquisition and retrieval. From the viewpoint of these professional users, the paramount goal is to achieve such direct control without sacrificing the valuable time and effort required to become experts in the esoteric art of computer programming and systems operation. This concept of immediate control was the basis for developing MEDATA, an amalgamation of techniques which allows the user to organize, collect, store, and retrieve all types of medical data without resorting to the intricacies of formal computer science.