| AAFP | American Academy of Family Physicians; American Academy of Family Practice |
|---|---|
| IMPAC | Information for Management, Planning, Analysis and Coordination |
| NHPIC | National Health Planning Information Center |
| FSU | family service unit; functional spine unit |
| IFSP | individualized family service plan |
| hospital information systems | Integrated, computer-assisted systems designed to store, manipulate, and retrieve information concerned with the administrative and clinical aspects of providing medical services within the hospital. (12 Dec 1998) |
|---|---|
| drug information services | Services providing pharmaceutic and therapeutic drug information and consultation. (12 Dec 1998) |
| information centres | Facilities for collecting and organizing information. They may be specialised by subject field, type of source material, persons served, location, or type of services. (12 Dec 1998) |
| information management | Management of the acquisition, organization, storage, retrieval, and dissemination of information. (12 Dec 1998) |
| information science | The field of knowledge, theory, and technology dealing with the collection of facts and figures, and the processes and methods involved in their manipulation, storage, dissemination, publication, and retrieval. It includes the fields of communication, publishing, library science and informatics. (12 Dec 1998) |
| information services | Organised services to provide information on any questions an individual might have using databases and other sources. (12 Dec 1998) |
| information storage and retrieval | A branch of computer or library science relating to the storage, locating, searching, and selecting, upon demand, relevant data on a given subject. (12 Dec 1998) |
| information system | Combination of vital and health statistical data from multiple sources, used to derive information and make decisions about the health needs, health resources, costs, use, and outcome of health care. (05 Mar 2000) |
| information systems | Integrated set of files, procedures, and equipment for the storage, manipulation, and retrieval of information. (12 Dec 1998) |
| information theory | An interdisciplinary study dealing with the transmission of messages or signals, or the communication of information. Information theory does not directly deal with meaning or content, but with physical representations that have meaning or content. It overlaps considerably with communication theory and cybernetics. (12 Dec 1998) |
| integrated advanced information management systems | A concept, developed in 1983 under the aegis of and supported by the national library of medicine under the name of integrated academic information management systems, to provide professionals in academic health sciences centres and health sciences institutions with convenient access to an integrated and comprehensive network of knowledge. It addresses a wide cross-section of users from administrators and faculty to students and clinicians and has applications to planning, clinical and managerial decision-making, teaching, and research. It provides access to various types of clinical, management, educational, etc., databases, as well as to research and bibliographic databases. In august 1992 the name was changed from integrated academic information management systems to integrated advanced information management systems to reflect use beyond the academic milieu. (12 Dec 1998) |
| operating room information systems | Information systems, usually computer-assisted, designed to store, manipulate, and retrieve information for planning, organizing, directing, and controlling administrative activities associated with the provision and utilization of operating room services and facilities. (12 Dec 1998) |
| radiotherapy planning, computer-assisted | Computer-assisted mathematical calculations of beam angles, intensities of radiation, and duration of irradiation in radiotherapy. (12 Dec 1998) |
| regional health planning | Planning for health resources at a community or regional level. (12 Dec 1998) |
| patient care planning | Usually a written medical and nursing care program designed for a particular patient. (12 Dec 1998) |