New millennium Hospital Management Information System: Experience of the National Cancer Institute, Cairo University

The National Cancer Institute-Cairo University (NCI) is a leading cancer center in the Middle East and Africa. It serves more than 15,000 new cases and more than 250,000 patient visit every year, The implementation of its Hospital Management Information System was completed and the system was operational in 1992. Although different modules were added to the HMIS, the core of the system has never been changed or updated. NCI evaluated its current system. NCI also evaluated the modern tools in databases and programming. NCI came to the conclusion that a new HMIS need to be installed. The needs of NCI staff were analyzed with consideration to budget issues and the limitations of a developing country. Different hardware, networking and software issues had to be considered in the updating. Arabization and customization were main factors in decision making.