Electronic Patient Records and Clinical Data Capture

For some years now I have been involved in providing clinical input and support into the development and maintenance of a bespoke electronic clinical patient record system within the Royal Veterinary College, London. As well as offering a practical solution to the management of patients within a busy referral centre, this system has allowed an increasing amount of clinical data to be captured and accessed for research and other epidemiological purposes.

Alongside this, I was involved at the outset in the formation of the VeNom Coding Group, a group that has developed and maintains a standard set of clinical veterinary terms, the VeNom Codes. These codes are intended for use in referral veterinary hospital electronic patient records and first-opinion veterinary practice management systems. The aims of the VeNom Coding Group are:

• To promote clinical data coding within veterinary medicine in general.
• To encourage and facilitate the use of the VeNom Codes across veterinary institutions, practices and other elements of the veterinary industry.

I am currently Chair of the VeNom Scientific Forum and member of the VeNom Management Group.

Please direct any enquries relating to the VeNom Codes to info@venomcoding.org.