Just a quickey - I know you're all busy !

Any Biomed departments out there using (or trying to ?) either of the following:

RAM (4000)
F2

We're looking for a system that'll work.
All comments would be appreciated - Ta!

Build your own, designed and built for BME what could be better?

Looks like all those departments are indeed too busy to respond, Garrith.

But when you say that "we're looking for a system that'll work" ... what do you actually mean, I wonder?

What system are you currently using (and what, if anything, is wrong with it)?

@Neil: don't be silly, Neil. These guys generally prefer something "off the shelf", that costs £££ thousands. Most folk don't have the time (man-years) that it takes to develop a decent system of their own.

We've just gone over to Medusa after many years of using the locally developed EQUIP. Its pretty good but is a steep learning curve for me!

I've heard about both of those (but unfortunately have not seen either of them).

Was Medusa the one developed by a guy from the RAF?

And ... are they available to others?

Don't know who developed Medusa but EQUIP was developed by our Clinical Engineering Dept years ago and is still used by some hospitals.

http://www.softpromedical.se

Could have been in the RAF, Geoff. Then left to go to Sweden to develop Medusa.

I'm sure Medusa is available to others, priced in either Krona or Euros (Sterling too for us)

Equip is in its death throws, not many users left now

What I can't understand, when someone asks about databases, is why people say write your own.

To answer Garrith, we did look at F2 as well as Medusa and, in my opinion, there wasn't a great deal of difference between the two.

What I can't understand is if EQUIP is (was) good, how come it hasn't continued to be developed?

Meanwhile (and briefly stated), reasons for developing your own system include:-

1) You retain full control
2) You get it to do exactly what you want it to
3) You don't need to stump up £££ thousands in the first instance (and often every year or so thereafter)

Also ... what happens when the developer of the off-the-shelf system decides they can "no longer support" your system (by which time you have become dependent upon it)?

Meanwhile, there is a Middle Way, and one that we may refer to (with some degree of accuracy) as the "Joe Emmerson Model" - where you adopt a well-known proprietary system, then mould it into what you want by a series of "add-ons" of your own devising.

Thanks for your comments - so far.

Currently using our 'home grown' Lotus Approach based system - has worked (still does to a point!) & been developed over the years, sadly, because of the increasing demand for more & more bureaucratic feedback to meet the reporting demands from the quango's (CQC, NHSLA etc), our system cannot easily produce these reports or maintenance schedules.

Time (who's got any of that anymore ?) to develop this further just isn't available, so an 'off the shelf' solution is sought - hence the original queery.

Ah yes, time!

Having spent, over recent years, large chunks of my life writing program functions and other routines involved in equipment maintenance databases (yes, sad I know), I guess I could write a book about how much time it all takes (and how best to utilise all that effort) ... if only I had the time! LOL.

Meanwhile, I doubt that you will ever find any application that will immediately and effortlessly jump through all the reporting hoops that are often required today, without having to invest a fair amount of time and effort in setting the thing up (not to mention transporting - and cleaning up, most likely - your existing data). And who knows what "they" will be asking for (demanding) tomorrow. Perhaps what you really need is report-producing software. That is, retaining your existing database and using *Crystal Reports (or whatever) to generate the reports. But that will still need £££'s of course, plus someone able to drive the thing!

Once again I can only suggest that you speak with Joe Emmerson at Lancaster about ways to integrate "off the shelf" software to produce reports in this or that format.

It is generally possible to export data from (almost) any database into either an intermediary format (for further formatting) or even directly into some other "package" with a view to producing the required report. I am not too familiar with Lotus Approach myself, but what type of files (format) does it deliver?

Or, to cut to the chase:- can Excel import them (for example)?

Maintenance schedules should not present too much of a problem. What exactly do you need them to do, I wonder? How do you like to organise them:- just on a straight calendar basis, or something a bit more interesting, like Risk-Based or what-have-you?

* Other database extraction and report generating software is available!