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Development of an Information Model for Storing Organ Donor Data Within an Electronic Medical Record

Affiliations of the authors: Department of Medical Informatics, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT (CJS, SMH, RSE, SPN); Department of Medical Informatics, Intermountain Health Care, Salt Lake City, UT (CJS, SMH, RSE, SPN, CT); Departments of Medical Informatics (RSE) and Surgery (JBS), LDS Hospital, Salt Lake City, UT.

Correspondence and reprints: Catherine J. Staes, MPH, BSN, Department of Medical Informatics, Intermountain Health Care, 4646 Lake Park Boulevard, Salt Lake City, UT 84120; e-mail: <Catherine.Staes{at}ihc.com>.

Received for publication: 09/03/04; accepted for publication: 11/25/04.

Objective: To develop a model to store information in an electronic medical record (EMR) for the management of transplant patients. The model for storing donor information must be designed to allow clinicians to access donor information from the transplant recipient's record and to allow donor data to be stored without needlessly proliferating new Logical Observation Identifier Names and Codes (LOINC) codes for already-coded laboratory tests.

Design: Information required to manage transplant patients requires the use of a donor's medical information while caring for the transplant patient. Three strategies were considered: (1) link the transplant patient's EMR to the donor's EMR; (2) use pre-coordinated observation identifiers (i.e., LOINC codes with *DONOR specified in the system axes) to identify donor data stored in the transplant patient's EMR; and (3) use an information model that allows donor information to be stored in the transplant patient's record by allowing the "source" of the data (donor) and the "name" of the result (e.g., blood type) to be post-coordinated in the transplant patient's EMR.

Results: We selected the third strategy and implemented a flexible post-coordinated information model. There was no need to create new LOINC codes for already-coded laboratory tests. The model required that the data structure in the EMR allow for the storage of the "subject" of the test.

Conclusion: The selected strategy met our design requirements and provided an extendable information model to store donor data. This model can be used whenever it is necessary to refer to one patient's data from another patient's EMR.

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