CHAPTER THREE

SYSTEM INVESTIGATION AND ANALYSIS

The system analysis encompasses those tasks that determine the needs or conditions to be
met for a new product, taking into account the possible conflicting requirements of the various
stakeholders such as beneficiaries or users. Software requirement specification is a complete
description of the behavior of the system to be developed. It includes a set of used cases that
describe all the interactions that the users will have with the software. System analysis is the first
stage in systems engineering process and software development process.

3.1 BACKGROUND INFORMATION ON CASE STUDY

The Polytechnic, Ibadan was established in 1970 as a successor to the erstwhile Technical
College, Ibadan under the provision of a principal Edict cited as The Polytechnic, Ibadan Edict
1970. This Edict has undergone several amendments in order to make The Polytechnic relevant
to the present day need of Oyo State, the Proprietor in particular and Nigeria in general.

The main Health Centre is located at the “Middle Belt” i.e. a vast area of land between the North
and South Campuses. It is an ultra-modern building complex facing the main link road.

The new health center building on the Main Campus has 18 bed spaces i.e. two wards of four
beds for each Male and Female patient; a room of two beds for male staff and a ward of two beds
for female staff; two private wards of two beds each; and two isolation rooms of one bed in each
one.

3.2 OPERATIONS OF EXISTING SYSTEM

The Health Center makes use of paper records to keep records of patients information
like Names, matric no, etc are written on paper to keep records. The user in charge takes all day
monitoring and maintaining all records which can later be lost or misplaced, over the years, the
existing system had been handling records manually.

In this regards, existing system gives a tedious work to the workers in the hospital while
registering the patients and keeping their records.

3.3 SYSTEM ANALYSIS

Hence, we are going to start with the analysis of the existing manual system under the
following heading: data collection, data storage, data communication and manipulation, data
security and system cost.

3.3.1 DATA COLLECTION

In hospital management system, the types of data that we require to collect are:
1. Patient’s Bio-data
i. Card No.
ii. Folder No.
iii. Name
iv. Address
v. Nationality
vi. Age
vii. Gender
viii. Marital Status
ix. E-mail Address
x. Phone No.
xi. City
xii. Religion
xiii. Country
2. Staff’s Registration Data
i. Name
ii. Email Address
iii. Gender
iv. Date of birth
v. Religion
vi. Marital Status
vii. Nationality
viii. Local Government
ix. Residential Address
x. Picture
 In the manual system used by The Polytechnic, Ibadan health care center, the
patients’ folders are packed into shelves in the patient record department. These folders
are grouped into shelves according to year of admission. A patient in need of any of these
folders will make a request at the records department where the staff in charge of these
folders will now choose from the shelves which one belongs to the patient. In the shelves,
the names are repeated because two or three persons may bear the same name. As a result
the patient folder number is preferably used to look for the folder. It takes a lot of time to
look for these folders and it may be impossible to retrieve a folder if the patient forgets
his or her card where the folder number is written. Inspecting the existing manual system
very closely reveals a lot of loopholes like data duplication, data redundancy, data
manipulation and data inconsistency which make the system inefficient and hence calls
for urgent improvement to the existing manual system. The improvement envisaged is the
proposed hospital management system.

3.3.2 DATA STORAGE

The Polytechnic, Ibadan Health Care Center uses the manual record system
require large space for storing records in shelves or alternatively dumping them on the
ground if the shelves overflow. The proposed system would save the data electronically.

3.3.3 DATA COMMUNICATION AND MANIPULATION

If the original forms of data were suitable for all purposes, less processing would
be necessary. Seldom, can the real objective of a transaction or situation be attained
without converting data into a more useful forms-manipulation. This conversion is
accompanied by one or more of the following procedures – sorting, comparing, analysis
and calculation. Difficulties arise when it actually comes to manipulation of data before
communication. Processing data manually consumes a lot of time; for instance, sorting of
folders into years of admission. This takes a lot of time. Hence the access time or process
time of the present system is extremely high and results in patients spending more time in
hospitals than is necessary. Now, with the availability of the hospital management
system, the need for improved speed of transaction processing could easily be
accomplished.
 3.3.4 DATA SECURITY

In the manual system, almost all the patient folders in the records have to be
accessed by a staff for every folder request. The patients’ record in a manual system is
not secure and confidential information may be accessed by unauthorized persons. The
manual system is subjected to risks and threats: for example events that may destroy or
corrupt records, prevent them from use, or steal them. The risk may be physical loss or
damage to storage devices holding the data including natural disaster, accident fire, and
dust. Theoretically, a folder last the length of a patient’s life. This means that in say
twenty years the number of folders accumulated by a hospital may be so large that it may
be impossible to manage them securely manually. Containment strategies, for example, to
archive folders may be adopted on the assumption that such folders may be inactive.
Such actions though pragmatic may be unwise and show clearly why electronic means
for managing hospital records may now be mandatory.

3.3.5 OUTPUT FROM THE SYSTEM

The IT system has revolutionized the field of medicine. In this fast-paced world of
medicine, it is a daunting task to manage a multi-specialty hospital. A hospital management
system (HMS) is a system that facilitates managing the functioning of the hospital or any
medical set up. This system or software will help in making the whole functioning paperless.
It integrates all the information regarding patients, doctors, staff, hospital administrative details
etc. into one software. It has sections for various professionals that make up a hospital.

Doctors

This section includes the list of the doctors and their schedules. It also includes doctors’
emergency numbers. The doctor can check his or her schedule such as checking his appointment
with patients and check if there is any message(s) for him or her. This helps a doctor to edit his
schedule accordingly. The patient can be given an appointment referring to the doctors’
schedule. The use of hospital management system makes the co-ordination between a doctor and
patient easy and hassle free.

Patient information
 New patients can be registered in the system. An electronic medical record system is in-
built which stores all the basic and medical details of the patient. One can also add a feature to
store photos of the patients as identity proof which can also help in medico-legal cases of false
identities or fraud. The patient(s) can also messages a doctor in relation to his or her medical
status and can book an appointment with the doctor or check if there is any message or
appointment for him or her.

Occupancy

Using this system one can quickly check the availability of rooms/beds so that the
receptionist (nurse) can adjust transfer of patients from one ward to another or allot the bed to the
new patient. This data is constantly updated to keep a track of discharged patients.

Billing

A separate automated section is meant for billing purposes. This system helps to sum up
all the expenses of a patient at one time and produce a complete bill at the end of the consultation
or at discharge in regards to bed allotment. This saves time and effort.

Employees

This section includes basic information of the employees including contact numbers and
address along with professional details. Every new employee is registered in the system.

Statistical Reports

All the data in the system is integrated and can be analyzed. This helps in creating a
statistical database for the internal use of the hospital which can be submitted to the
administration.

3.4 PROBLEMS IDENTIFIED FROM EXISTING SYSTEM

Healthcare Management is a catastrophe in the Institution. Patients have to suffer from

1. Time consuming.
2. Too much of paper work
3. Loss of information collected from patients and manual way of keeping patients files
4. Problems in retrieving patients’ files.

3.5 SUGGESTED SOLUTION TO PROBLEM IDENTIFIED

1. “Hospital Care” enables hospitals and doctors to better serve their patients.
2. Improved patient and doctor relationship.
3. Reducing the time spent by staff filling out forms, freeing resources for more critical
tasks
4. Better quality of care, procedures and service to Patients.
5. Enhancing communication between the doctors’ and the patients.
6. Every system user should have a unique username and password which shall be assigned
by the administrator.
7. The system shall be use to input, update, retrieve and delete records
8. The users(except the administrator) should have no right to delete information from the
system
Regard to the intended users of the system, the following supposition will be made:
9. That the user shall have a basic knowledge of working with computers
10. That the user shall have a basic knowledge of the English language which is use in the
GUI and associated document.