Oncology Outreach Evaluation

Shortly after the project was funded, the initial principle investigator (PI) left the military. There was a delay in locating a replacement PI. There was limited information available on the ITB system and its operation that required a combined clinical/technical team to go to TAMC to interview the developers of the system a%d see how the system was used. Upon arriving at TAMC, the team found that the contractor programmer no longer worked for TAMC and there was no technical documentation to describe how the system was developed. Several detailed interview revealed that the system required two separate Web/database servers along with their respective software and support. Further interviews revealed that the system required a full- time system administrator to manually process and prepare slide presentations for the actual tumor board members to view. This additional FTE requirement added approximately $120,000 to the yearly operation of the project, which was unacceptable for our application. As a result, the project objectives were modified and a video tumor board resulted. With the long-term goal of implementing a cost effective and deployable Internet Tumor Board, this project is developing a new Web-based ITB that models the success of the Teledermatology system deployed throughout the AMEDD. The new ITB is signed to utilize 14 main reusable modules that will not only facilitate the creation of this product, but will minimize the development costs of future Web-based clinical telemedicine systems.