The Center for Biomedical Informatics
State University of Campinas, Brazil
Research Abstracts
A MICROCOMPUTER SOFTWARE LABORATORY FOR TEACHING INFORMATICS
TO MEDICAL STUDENTS
Renato M.E. Sabbatini
Chair of Medical Informatics, Faculty of Medical Sciences,
and Center for Biomedical Informatics, State University of Campinas,
Brazil.
This paper reports the development of a suite of
microcomputer programs, which were used in a regular course on Medical
Informatics to medical and nursing undergraduate students as a software
resource for demonstrations and hands-on experience with medical
applications. The 12 programs have a simple and standard user
interface, and cover the following applications: medical records,
patient interviewing, risk assessment, coding of medical data,
laboratory automation, biological signal and image processing,
computer-assisted diagnosis and therapy, medical research and
education, and epidemiology. User guidelines and proposed exercises
complement the use of these programs in a Medical Informatics course.
The results obtained so far were very good: an increase in student
awareness of potential benefits and limitations of applications of
computers to Medicine; an interest in using the software for their own
purposes; a fostering of personal computer skills and independent
learning. Other medical schools are currently adopting our software e
course layout, due to its compactness, effectiveness and low cost,
particularly for developing countries.
Published in:
International European Congress of Medical Informatics MIE'90, Glasgow,
Scotland, August 1990.
Last Updated: March 2, 1996
renato@sabbatini.com
