Using modern information technology to profile faculty activities

Most academic medical centers (AMCs) have developed mechanisms for tracking the financing of their faculty members' research and clinical activities. However, information systems for managing and reporting financial data often do not provide fully accurate or complete pictures of the accomplishments of an institution or its faculty. Modern information technology can help AMCs integrate more extensive information about their faculties from many different sources; in particular, Web publishing technologies permit large numbers of users to have easy secure access to databases across different platforms. The authors briefly describe five faculty information systems now in use. They then describe in detail the development and implementation of one of these systems, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine Faculty Information System (FIS), which uses Web publishing technologies, collecting and making available information about the clinical, teaching, and research activities of faculty members.