Integrating Brazilian health information systems in order to support the building of data warehouses

Abstract

Introduction This paper's aim is to develop a data warehouse from the integration of the files of three Brazilian health information systems concerned with the production of ambulatory and hospital procedures for cancer care, and cancer mortality. These systems do not have a unique patient identification, which makes their integration difficult even within a single system. Methods Data from the Brazilian Public Hospital Information System (SIH-SUS), the Oncology Module for the Outpatient Information System (APAC-ONCO) and the Mortality Information System (SIM) for the State of Rio de Janeiro, in the period from January 2000 to December 2004 were used. Each of the systems has the monthly data production compiled in dbase files (dbf). All the files pertaining to the same system were then read into a corresponding table in a MySQL Server 5.1. The SIH-SUS and APAC-ONCO tables were linked internally and with one another through record linkage methods. The APAC-ONCO table was linked to the SIM table. Afterwards a data warehouse was built using Pentaho and the MySQL database management system. Results The sensitivities and specificities of the linkage processes were above 95% and close to 100% respectively. The data warehouse provided several analytical views that are accessed through the Pentaho Schema Workbench. Conclusion This study presented a proposal for the integration of Brazilian Health Systems to support the building of data warehouses and provide information beyond those currently available with the individual systems.