Title: An Eclipse-based development approach to health information technology

Authors: Wullianallur Raghupathi, Wei Gao

Addresses: Graduate School of Business, Fordham University, 113 W. 60th Street, NY 10023, New York, USA. ' Graduate School of Business, Fordham University, 113 W. 60th Street, NY 10023, New York, USA

Abstract: The rapid proliferation of applications – electronic health record and clinical decision support systems among them – cannot keep up with the growing needs of healthcare delivery organisations. The absence of uniform standards and interoperability has hindered the successful deployment and acceptance of these applications. Eclipse and other open source applications have the potential to fill some of these gaps. The benefits include acceptance of open standards, enabling interoperability and scalability, prevention of vendor lock-in and lower costs. In this paper, we describe an Eclipse-based open source electronic health record application, a prototype. We contrast the Eclipse approach to other development approaches. Implementation is feasible and provides customisation, although there are challenges to overcome. We envision organisations adopting open source development tools as alternatives to vendor-driven, proprietary systems.

Keywords: Eclipse development platform; electronic health records; EHR; health information technology; HIT; open source software; OSS; electronic healthcare; e-health; open standards; interoperability; scalability; medical records.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEH.2007.015322

International Journal of Electronic Healthcare, 2007 Vol.3 No.4, pp.433 - 452

Published online: 08 Oct 2007 *

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