“The emergency department of a hospital is about to transition to an Emergency Medical Record (EMR) system. Design and develop a discrete-event simulation that allows doctors to view patients, assign themselves to patients, and to view patient charts. New patients arrive at random intervals and are assigned rooms by the triage nurse. When a room is assigned, the ward view updates to indicate a new, unassigned patient is waiting to see a physician. To simulate patients leaving the ED, patients will have a 5% chance to leave Against Medical Advice (AMA), a 20% chance of being assigned – and then discharged – by another physician, a 10% chance of being admitted, and a 35% chance that they will continue to wait. In this simulation, no patients die.

When a patient is double-clicked in the ward view, a window opens to display the patient’s name, date of birth, age and vitals. The patient’s vitals include heart rate, blood pressure and O2 saturation. The doctor may then start a new chart or view past charts. Starting a new chart opens a text editor. The option of viewing past charts opens a list of charts. A chart on the list may then be opened read-only for perusal.”

So pre-alpha it hurts.