Medical notes need to have some obvious design features common to many other computer software.
- locking: only one person able to change the record - auditing: keeping records of who read what, when, and where they did it - signing: any additions are cryptographically signed and timestamped - sharing: many clinicians need to be able to access the data across a wide range of hospital networks.
The UK NHS spent £11bn on a system which was late or didn't appear.
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-15014288)
About 10,000 people in England die each year because a clinician makes a mistake with the meds. While that risk is very low (because there are a huge number of patients taking a huge number of meds) it'd be nice if something simple could be done to reduce that number.