Facts and fiction about HiX Data Warehouse

Hospitals not (working towards) collecting, managing and using data has become almost impossible to imagine. Data, provided it is securely stored and correctly interpreted, is the ideal way for care providers, managers, and IT staff to meet their information needs. HiX Data Warehouse offers a custom solution to do just that. The possibilities to access medical data from EHRs and to set up links between the data warehouse and other sources allow you to take a major step towards successful data-driven healthcare. Experts reveal the truth about the most important facts and fiction about HiX Data Warehouse.

HiX Data Warehouse only contains medical data from HiX

Fiction!

Although HiX Data Warehouse does have a direct link to HiX and hence to the medical data, these data are not only of a medical nature. The accessed HiX data concern production, quality and safety, but also logistics and planning. In addition, other data sources can be linked to HiX Data Warehouse. These sources can be used to make reports concerning the specific information needs of hospitals.

HiX Data Warehouse has a set of standard content reports that cover the entire care process

Fact!

Four information marts offer a large variety of reports and data cubes regarding the most important healthcare themes: logistics and planning, care production, quality and safety, and medical. With our pre-configured content based on these themes, we can use the HiX Data Warehouse to provide insight into data on the entire care process. Moreover, the standard content also supports self-service business intelligence (BI), in the form of data models, for example.

Every day, 'all' HiX data are loaded into the data warehouse

Fiction!

It is true that, once the data from HiX is loaded into the data warehouse, all data from small tables are loaded again every day, but a primary key will be placed wherever possible. These keys only allow changed data to come through. After a first complete load, only the changes will be loaded regularly. This process is called an incremental refresh and considerably reduces refresh time. Incremental refreshes are often used for very large data tables. This way, data can be loaded with a higher frequency so that up-to-date reports can be generated daily, even with large quantities of data.

A data warehouse is the basis for a complete BI landscape for healthcare institutions

Fact!

HiX Data Warehouse has the structure of an enterprise data warehouse, with a central data vault, where the data of approximately forty HiX modules are integrated. The data from HiX primarily concern healthcare, but of course, other processes occur in care institutions as well. This is why the architecture of HiX Data Warehouse has been designed to facilitate connections to the rest of the BI landscape. It is also possible to integrate components such as business support (such as personnel systems), research, education, and control. You can even link your own data warehouse to HiX Data Warehouse without any problems.

Standard content renders the BI department of a hospital redundant

Fiction!

Data driven healthcare is becoming increasingly important. The standard, or pre-configured, content available in the HiX Data Warehouse offers insight into the most important standard processes in care institutions and hospitals. Using this standard content saves hospitals a lot of time. The BI team of the institution can then spend this time to develop institution-specific reports that require local knowledge. Using the data warehouse in this way allows hospitals to work more efficiently and to use data to their fullest potential.

HiX Data Warehouse is the best way to provide access to the data in HiX

Fact!

If you use HiX Data Warehouse as a basis for reports that use the data, you will not, or hardly ever, need to adjust these reports whenever the table structure in HiX changes, whether you use standard content reports or reports made by your own BI department. This is because the table structure change will also be processed in the data warehouse. As a result, the number of problems that care institutions have when their systems migrate to newer HiX versions, will be minimal. This saves time, money and work, and more importantly: the hospital can continue to function with next to no interruption.  

The hospital itself must devise a way to use the pre-configured content of the data warehouse

Fiction!

From the very start of the project stage, ChipSoft actively contributes ideas about the best ways to use the data warehouse and about who should use it. On project days, our data warehouse team discusses the possibilities and available content with the BI team and the end users. In order to help the organisation, we have a communication plan and a website with various kinds of smart and convenient tools to support the implementation and launch of HiX Data Warehouse by the hospital.

The care institution can conduct the technical management of the data warehouse completely on its own

Fact!

Yes, this is a fact! During the implementation and project stage, our data warehouse team spends a lot of time on the preconditions for management, in order to prepare your organisation as best as possible for proper management of the data warehouse. For your staff, an important part of this preparation is the management training course and the extensive application manager's manual. Some organisations use an external party to manage their data warehouse. You may choose to do so, but it is perfectly possible for your organisation itself to manage it.