Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

Re:Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die by dreamcompiler on Thursday October 31, 2019 @10:44AM (#21409364)

As a counterexample it's easy to get this wrong as well. In my EMT career we switched from doing run reports on paper to doing it on the computer. It was a nightmare. No attention to good UI principles had been paid. In the section on "What drugs did you administer?" we had to choose from a scrolling menu of perhaps 100 items for each drug we used (including oxygen which we used on everybody). Simply typing in their names would have been easy, but no. Every data element was like that. A report that took me 20 minutes on paper took 45 minutes on the web version. Classic enterprise software.

Edit: Above was an attempt at digitization while this thread is about form automation. Understood. My point is that there was a lot of automation that could have been employed but wasn't. With that and good UI principles, the org could have made us more efficient. They chose not to because what they really wanted was a searchable database of patients treated so they could get more funding. EMT productivity was never a consideration.

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Re:Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die by Master_Odin on Thursday October 31, 2019 @09:03PM (#21415378)

Bad UI is basically consistent in all descriptions of all healthcare software. After working for a couple first responder outfits, I'm increasingly positive the companies who make this software do not have anyone on staff who have actually worked in the field, nor are they willing to interview people who have.

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Re:Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die by teyc on Friday November 01, 2019 @06:37PM (#21424408)

There's a case in Australia where the scheduled claxane was not administered because the table which had the status was off screen because the table was too wide (it was scheduled, but was marked as "cancelled"). The patient died.

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Re:Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die by flukus on Friday November 01, 2019 @02:07AM (#21416586)

> In the section on "What drugs did you administer?" we had to choose from a scrolling menu of perhaps 100 items for each drug we used

I've seen a similar thing at a medical insurance company, not sure if this one was access (that they made IT take over) or winforms, but to make things even worse the list was un-ordered and semi-random. I only found out about it because the main user was bitching to me on a smoke break, but it had been this way for years and cost her at least a couple of hours a day. After the 5 minutes of work to slap an order by clause in there and the weeks worth work getting it though the bureaucracy (yay for that stupid process of billing internal clients) she was in tears.

Efficient and automated claims processing was the whole reason this company existed too.

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Re:Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die by dragonsngoblins on Thursday October 31, 2019 @08:53PM (#21415329)

I imagine this was partly an attempt at data normalization. If you'd been allowed to type it in they would have had to worry about differences in spelling, capitalization, etc.

I'm not saying the solution they used was a good one mind, but I bet that was part of the motivation to implement it that way

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Re:Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die by dreamcompiler on Friday November 01, 2019 @01:55AM (#21416562)

I expect you're right, but there are better ways (e.g. autocomplete) to achieve that.

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Re:Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die by dragonsngoblins on Sunday November 03, 2019 @06:08PM (#21437410)

Oh most definitely. I didn't want to imply they went about it in an even half reasonable way, just that the motivation of designing the interface like that had nothing to do with optimizing for time spent filling it in

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Re:Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die by aspectmin on Friday November 01, 2019 @12:43AM (#21416337)

Did this software company come from a company with a three letter name? :)

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