II. Some Methods of Reducing Cost Time and Risk in the Application of Information Technology in Health Care: Overview of the File Manager

摘要

The VA File Manager is a field-developed application programming tool, written in the standard MUMPS programming language, that was designed to assist an extensive field-conducted VA health care and medical administrative automation effort. The File Manager increases the speed at which computer specialists can develop computer programs in the already facile MUMPS language and enables nonprogrammers to develop substantive applications without even learning a programming language. These are primarily textual applications having substantial data bases. The File Manager has been actively used by computer professionals, clinicians and medical administrators at VA Medical Centers (VAMCs) for over two years. A significant number of File Manager-based applications that are actively used at one or more VAMCs nationwide have resulted from this use.