A Virtual Medical Center
Project to link Medical School with major affiliated hospitals

The Faculty of Medicine includes about 14,000 people, the great majority of whom have their work spaces in Harvard Medical School's affiliated hospitals. The institutions are physically separated, which is a serious obstacle to the communications essential for research and teaching. The answer to this problem, says Medical School Dean for Clinical Affairs Richard Kitz, may be found in new communications technology: the creation of a virtual medical center.

"About 90 percent of HMS faculty practice, teach, and do research in the geographically separated affiliated institutions," Kitz says. "An interactive Harvard Medical Network will help overcome the geographic impediment and enhance the common research and teaching mission."

The Medical School's Office for Clinical Affairs and the Department of Information Technology, together with clinical departments at Harvard's major affiliated hospitals, are collaborating to create the virtual Harvard Medical Center.

The effort uses World Wide Web technology, with its capability for establishing instant connections between different home pages developed at the various departments and institutions.

Each clinical department in the affiliated hospitals is to develop a Web page that will link to parallel departments' home pages across the Medical Area. For example, the departments of surgery in each of the major hospitals would have their own Web pages linked with each other and with HMS via the Harvard Surgery Department's home page, to be set up on Countway Library's Web server.

This ambitious project, which is now being tested by sharing information about anaesthesia, depends on close cooperation among the Medical School and its affiliated hospitals.

Anaesthesia Project

To initiate the project, Harvard's Department of Anaesthesia Executive Committee agreed to participate in a "proof-of-concept" program.

A World Wide Web Anaesthesia Task Force was appointed to organize the project, with representatives from each of the Harvard hospital anaesthesia departments that have major research programs and approved residencies and fellowships. The task force is co-chaired by Kitz and Associate Dean for Information Services Daniel Moriarty.

Participating hospitals have each fashioned a Web page that is linked to the Harvard Anaesthesia Network home page, which lists all relevant faculty members by academic rank and hospital, as well as trainees. This home page also contains descriptions of the Harvard Anaesthesia Simulation Center, Harvard Anaesthesia Research Center, relevant courses in Continuing Medical Education, generic resident application forms, and a history of anaesthesia at Harvard.

Each of the affiliates' Web pages has a common look and feel to facilitate finding and accessing information from one to the other, but each page contains information (both text and multimedia) only about that hospital's individual departments. Descriptions of the departments' clinical efforts, resident and fellowship programs, conferences and educational activities, research projects, and history can be accessed from the affiliates' pages via active links.

The Harvard Anaesthesia Network has been up for six months now, with online information (including forms for online completion) for student, resident, and fellowship applicants to the various programs. Because all trainees, regardless of the institution of origin, rotate through all of the major affiliates as part of their medical education, the task force will soon implement color coded online schedules of trainee rotations. Each of the institutions will be providing information on the various educational programs it offers (lectures, seminars, workshops) for trainees, faculty, and alumni.

Future plans call for electronic links with alumni to provide job search information -- a special concern for those about to complete their medical studies. This will allow residents and fellows finishing their clinical and research training to contact alumni about appropriate positions.

The response has been enthusiastic, and plans to replicate the Harvard Anaesthesia Network are now under way. The developers anticipate that by the end of the 1997 academic year, most clinical departments will be networked with each other and with the School to form the virtual center.

Integrating Faculty Information

Allied with the Web Anaesthesia Task Force is the HMS Integrated Faculty Information System (IFIS) Committee, chaired by Associate Dean Carol Stolberg. One of its major projects is to provide capabilities for online completion of the forms and documentation required by the School for primary appointments, reappointments, and promotions.

Up until now the forms and documentation have always been provided in paper only, but considering that there are 14,000 appointments to the School, the online capability should enable major savings in effort and perhaps costs. The project will enter a pilot phase later this year.

The Harvard Anaesthesia Network can be found at http://www.med.harvard.edu/programs/anesthesia/new

A Virtual Medical Center Project to link Medical School with major affiliated hospitals

A Virtual Medical Center
Project to link Medical School with major affiliated hospitals