A computerized bedside clinical information system for an intensive care unit teaching service

The CLINICAL REFERENCE LIBRARY, a subsystem of the Hewlett Packard 5600A Patient Data Management System, contains 20 information modules. Topics range from airway management and nutritional support to aspiration pneumonia and septic shock. The user is able to flip rapidly back and forth through any module or from one module to another, much as one would flip through a book. Using a classical non randomized, pre-test-post-test, control-experimental research paradigm, medical students and residents exposed to the system "acquired" more knowledge than their counterparts who used conventional teaching methods (p<0.05). Medical students and nurses accessed the system for continuing medical education whereas residents used the system for problem-solving. Nurses had strong negative views about the use and feasibility of computerized patient data management.