The use of clinical information to help develop new services in a district general hospital

This paper describes a case study of the use of clinical information to improve gastroenterological services in a district general hospital. The clinical information has been derived from aggregation and analysis of operational clinical data collected in coded, structured form on a clinical information system over a period of 8 years. The monitoring of activity, referral patterns and administrative and clinical outcomes, and the use of this information to develop new services to improve access to patients are described. It is concluded that the secondary use of clinical information derived from electronically captured data can have a significant impact on the development of services by a provider organisation, and on professional teamworking.