Medical examination for first admission students at the University of Mexico. Characteristics and evaluation of a computerized system

: Four hundred and thirty, first admission university students underwent medical examination during the school period 1979-1980. After the application of the electronic processed medical inquest, the final clinical diagnosis was reached. In 87% of the cases, a final diagnosis was worked out, whereas the remaining 13% was considered clinically healthy. Likewise, the proportion of final clinical diagnoses that were found to be correlated with the probability diagnoses issued by the inquest system wer above 60% in the following systems: digestive, E.N.T., respiratory, genitourinary and dermatological. On the other hand, on studying the final clinical diagnoses determined by the physician and that were not worked out by the computerized medical inquest system, variable proportions were observed in the different organs and systems that were investigated. Thus, it is concluded that medical inquest used at present for the study of health problems involving the first admission student population at the University of Mexico, is a useful procedure that requires a continuous evaluation to improve its effectiveness and trustworthiness, but that has allowed to cover adequately the demand for medical care among the above mentioned population.