Preoperative information management system using wireless PDAs.

Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) and wireless communication are currently available in clinical settings. We developed wireless PDA software that assists anesthesiologists in pre-operative patient assessment. The device communicates with the hospital information system through a wireless LAN and is equipped with pre-programmed data entry templates for pre-operative assessment. As a preliminary test of the device, we randomly assigned residents in preoperative assessment to an intervention and a control arm and compared the results.