International Journal of Technology Assessment in Health Care, 8:1 (1992), 198-209. Copyright © 1992 Cambridge University Press. Printed in the U.S.A. THE POTENTIAL FOR MEDICAL INFORMATICS IN THE EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN REGION Mukhtar S. A. AL-Hashimi LDS Hospital/University of Utah and University of Bahrain T. Allan Pryor LDS Hospital/University of Utah Abstract This article assesses the potential value of an integrated medical/hospital information system (IMIS) for the members of the Eastern Mediterranean Region of the World Health Organization, and describes the preliminary results of a feasibility study questionnaire done in December 1989 at Salmaniya Med- ical Center (SMC) in the state of Bahrain. Health care professionals face the dual challenge of keeping up with a rapidly expanding body of medical knowledge and of finding an optimal way to apply it to improve pa- tient care (3). The assessment of a health care technology is the process of trying to understand its significant consequences. An effective technology assessment aims at balancing economic capabilities and human needs. Today the applications of computers in the medical field, which range from data collection to medical diagnosis, form a discipline called "medical informatics". Ac- cording to Greenes and Shortliffe (8), "Medical Informatics is the field that concerns itself with the cognitive, information processing, and communication tasks of medical practice, education, and research, including the information science and the technology to support these tasks." For example, there are programs that can diagnose infections and make suggestions regarding medical treatment (16). Friedman and Martin (6) describe the practical model of a Hospital Information System (HIS), which can be summarized in the following manner: (a) core application modules that perform or assist with the basic hospital functions; (b) business, managerial, and financial modules that perform or assist with the traditional finan- cial functions; (c) communications and networking modules that allow and facilitate communication among all resources; (d) departmental management systems that as- sist in the managerial process in order to manage, plan, and improve efficiency; (e) This study is the result of cooperation between the authors and the Ministry of Health in the state of Bahrain. The authors thank the Salmaniya Medical Center staff in Bahrain, the University of Bahrain, and the Ara- bian Gulf University Medical School for their support. 198