Developing a health care information system for Scotland.

The rapid development and uptake of Internet technology has created opportunities for large-scale information networks to replace paper-based information sources. In order to obtain the maximum benefits for patients and medical practitioners it is important that health care providers work together to produce an integrated information service. However, the task of bringing together a large number of different information providers to create a huge structured pool of information covering a wide range of topics with appropriate quality assurance is non-trivial. This paper describes an approach being used to create healthcare information systems in a set of co-operative healthcare information networks in Europe, and specifically in Scotland.