A Computerised Clinical Audit System in Practice

Professional self-audit which provides information on clinical workload and performance is a useful adjunct in patient care (Dudley, 1974). The impetus for critical evaluation of medical performance has come from clinicians who have utilised the available resources to collect information and conduct analyses of their own workload and performances (Corbett et al. 1984; Prout and Blood 1985; Broughton et al. 1985). In the past, data collection in the National Health Service involved the encoding of patients’ admissions for a Hospital Activity Analysis (HAA). The data is passed into the administrative system on paper forms and reappears at the clinical level in a manner which is not directly helpful to patient care, as detail is limited and the information may be many months old. Furthermore, it is not possible to get more detailed information should a significant query be generated from the information provided. Clearly this is an insecure base on which to change management policies.