Health Care Computing: A Survival guide for PC users

212 Pages·1995·5.842 MB·English

by  Philip Burnard (auth.)

Health Care Computing
Health Care Computing
A survival guide for PC users
PHILIP BURNARD
School of Nursing Studies
University of Wales College of Medicine
Heath Park
Cardiff
UK
I~nl
SPRINGER-SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, BV
Distributed in the USA and Canada by Singular Publishing Group Inc.,
4284 41st Street, San Diego, California 92105
First edition 1995
© 1995 Philip Burnard
Originally published by Chapman & Hall in 1995
Typeset in 10.5/13 pt Palatino by Best-set Typesetter Ltd., Hong Kong
ISBN 978-0-412-60530-7 ISBN 978-1-4899-3234-1 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4899-3234-1
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private
study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the UK Copyright
Designs and Patents Act, 1988, this publication may not be reproduced,
stored, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior
permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic
reporduction only in accordance with the terms of the licences issued by
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terms of licences issued by the appropriate Reproduction Rights
Organization outside the UK. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside
the terms stated here should be sent to the publishers at the London
address printed on this page.
The publisher makes no representation, express or implied, with
regard to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and
cannot accept any legal responsibility or liability for any errors or
omissions that may be made.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
§
Printed on permanent acid-free text paper, manufactured in
accordance with ANSIINISO Z39.48-1992 and ANSIINISO Z39.48-1984
(Permanence of Paper).
For Sally, Aaron and Rebecca
Contents
Acknowledgements viii
Introduction 1
1 Tips and traps in buying a personal computer 5
2 Tips and traps in buying software 27
3 Tips and traps in setting up your machine 51
4 Tips and traps in using DOS 65
5 Tips and traps in using Windows 75
6 Tips and traps in managing files 97
7 Tips and traps in wordprocessing 109
8 Tips and traps in using databases 135
9 Tips and traps in writing and designing documents with a
computer 155
10 Tips and traps in using computers for research 173
Appendix The Data Protection Act 1984. Guideline 1:
Introduction to the Act 199
References 209
Index 211
Acknowledgements
All trade marks of software, companies and publishers are acknowl
edged. Thanks, as ever, to my son, Aaron, who has taught me a
considerable amount about computers and has helped me to survive
with a personal computer. Thanks also to Marianne Talberg of the
University of Tampere for allowing me to use her personal library of
books and papers on computing in Helsinki, Finland.
Particular thanks go to Computer Manuals, 50 James Road, Tyseley,
Birmingham B11 2BA for supplying review copies of many of the books
that are referred to in this book. Acknowledgements go to the Editor of
Windows User for permission to reproduce, in Chapters 2 and 5, details
from Mark Stephens' article 'The Happy Shopper', from the December
1993 edition of that magazine.
Introduction
Most health professionals have to use computers - at least some of the
time. Frequently, those computers are personal computers - the generic
name for the ones that are variously known as 'IBM compatible' or
'IBM clones' or just PCs. This separates them out from certain other
makes such as the Apple Macintosh, the Amstrad dedicated word
processor, the Atari, Amiga and a number of others. This book is about
PCs.
When you need information about your computer when you are
busy, you don't want to have to wade through piles of manuals to
find what you need. You often need a fairly straightforward piece
of information - now. Computers can be infuriating. When they are
up and running properly, they can save time and help you to be
more productive. When something goes wrong, they can be extremely
frustrating. Once you have called in someone else to fix your problem,
it is often apparent that the answer to your problem was only a few
keystrokes away. This book aims at supplying you with small chunks
of information that can aid your productivity, get you out of awkward
corners and help you to become more at home with your Pc. It has
been my experience - as a health care lecturer and as a regular com
puter user - that you need to develop a certain baseline of confidence
in working with them. At first, you are almost afraid to touch the
keyboard unless anything goes wrong. Then, you become more skilled
in using the machine but still need to call on someone else to help you
out. Finally, you build up a stock of knowledge that allows you to work
out most things for yourself. In the end, there is, of course, a limited
number of things that can go wrong with a Pc. This book offers you
information - some basic and some not so basic - that can help you to
understand aspects of your computer and figure out how to manage on
your own.
2 Health Care Computing
With the idea of giving you maximum information in a fairly small
amount of space and to make that information more digestible, the
book is made up of a series of chapters containing tips, traps and help
boxes.
Each tip section contains a discrete piece of information about
the topic in question. All of these tips are indexed at the back
of the book.
Tip
Each trap section highlights a potential problem and suggests
ways of overcoming it. Like the tips, these are indexed at the
back of the book.
Trap
'Help' sections offer more details about specific issues. They
offer background detail and further information about the
topic contained in the chapter. Refer to them when you need
to go deeper into a topic.
Help
Computers can be fun as well as infuriating. Many of the tips in this
book are of the sort that will help you to speed up your work and make
your PC run more efficiently. These days, personal computers are
extremely powerful and it is important to use that power as effectively
as possible. It is not uncommon to find people using only a small
percentage of the capacity of their computers simply because they are
not set up properly. It is also possible to come across people who use
them as glorified typewriters and who work in ways that are more
suited to a typewriter. Again, there are tips about getting the most
out of your machine when preparing documents, reports, articles and
books. It is said that PCs are used far more for wordprocessing than
for any other function. It pays to use that wordprocessing power
effectively.
Each chapter of the book ends with a detailed review of one or two
other books related to the chapter topic. At the end of the book, I have
included a list of some other books about computing.
This book can be read on its own or as a companion volume to my
Introduction 3
previous title Personal Computing for Health Professionals, also published
by Chapman & Hall, which offers a broad introduction to personal
computing. In this one, I have purposely adopted the concise approach
to identifying information about computing. The book is aimed at the
newcomer and also at the person who has had some experience of
computing but who wants to know more.
The computing world is changing rapidly. Processors, printers and
programs alter almost daily. Indeed, some software companies have
stopped quoting a 'recommended price' for their products, knowing
that such figures would quickly be grossly undercut in the market
place. Given the rapid changes in pricing policy, I have not quoted any
prices. I have also aimed at discussing only those programs that are
fairly widely available and seem likely to remain current for a few
years - even if they are updated at regular intervals. Programs like
WordPerfect and Word for Windows, for example, have been in produc
tion for a number of years and it seems unlikely that they will suddenly
disappear.
Computers can free health professionals to do what they were
trained and educated to do. Health care educators can use them to
enhance their teaching methods and to help their students to learn
more effectively. Managers and those in the clinical field can also
benefit from their capacity to store and recall information rapidly. We
cannot avoid computers and we may as well make the most of them. I
hope that this book aids that process and makes personal computing
easier and, perhaps, more interesting.
WHO IS THIS BOOK FOR?
This is for anyone who is using a personal computer (IBM compatible
or 'clone'). It assumes that any health professional using it will have got
to the stage of starting the computer and beginning to use it. Thus it is
for 'beginners and intermediate' users. These include the following
groups:
• Students in the health care professions;
• Managers;