Customer stories


Oregon Department of Human Services

A state health department manages essential epidemiology data with a powerful, internally developed system of FileMaker Pro databases.

Tracking communicable disease reports from across an entire state is a vital, potentially lifesaving job—one that requires processing vast amounts of interrelated lab, clinical, and epidemiological data. That challenge requires the right tools, and within the Communicable Disease Epidemiology Section of the Oregon State Department of Human Services, the mission's accomplished with FileMaker Pro, the award-winning database software application from FileMaker, Inc.


Business challenges

 "In one sense, data management is what epidemiologists do,” explains Dr. William Keene. He's a senior epidemiologist in Oregon's Acute and Communicable Disease Program, and a FileMaker Pro user for nearly a decade. "We had used custom database software for over a decade, but it was a slow and confusing system that was very user-unfriendly. We kept saying that we could make a better system ourselves using off-the-shelf software, and finally decided to stop complaining and do something about it. We built our own system using FileMaker Pro, and now most of the data we rely on are at our fingertips. We have many databases, but the most important and mission-critical is that used to hold communicable disease reports dating back to 1988. These data are used daily by our epidemiologists to analyze disease trends, identify and track outbreaks, and summarize data for routine or ad-hoc purposes. We also export de-identified data for pooling with other states as part of national disease surveillance activities and for sharing with the general public.”


Successful solution

 

The Acute and Communicable Disease Program has dozens of individual and multi-user FileMaker Pro databases. "Our largest database contains over 70,000 records of individual disease reports,” Dr. Keene notes. "It has about 70 data fields, along with over 100 calculated fields and dozens of layouts. It currently runs about 70 megabytes, but it's still very fast and easy to use, and we expect performance and the user experience to only get better when we rebuild it in FileMaker Pro 7.” Other databases are used to track outbreak investigations, process questionnaire data, and perform many other essential functions relating to disease surveillance.


"There's no question, development in FileMaker Pro 7 is much easier than in earlier versions. It's faster, more powerful, and more intuitive. Many things that could only be accomplished with obscure tricks and workarounds are now very straightforward. "

Dr. William Keene, epidemiologist, Oregon Department of Human Services, Adult and Communicable Disease Program


Customer benefits

 State agencies traditionally don't operate on lavish budgets, and that means every penny counts. For Dr. Keene's department, the ease of development in FileMaker Pro is a real plus, allowing all of the many databases in use to be created and maintained by what he refers to as "advanced amateurs,” who develop many of the solutions on their own time and without the benefit of any specialized training.

And with FileMaker Pro 7, this ease of use will offer even greater advantages. "There's no question—development in FileMaker Pro 7 is much easier than in earlier versions,” Dr. Keene declares. "It's faster, more powerful, and more intuitive. Many things that could only be accomplished with obscure tricks and workarounds are now very straightforward. Not only will this make it faster for experienced developers, but it will make development of sophisticated solutions that much more available to beginning and intermediate users.”

Dr. Keene is also enthusiastic about other enhanced capabilities in FileMaker Pro 7, including the ability to develop and reuse custom functions, the ability to embed documents from other applications in container fields, and the ability to combine tables within single database files. "It is clear that FileMaker Pro 7 offer enormous advances for developers wishing to build sophisticated solutions efficiently, but while there's a lot new under the hood, FileMaker Pro 7 retains a very similar look-and-feel for those who've used databases developed in earlier versions.”



Contact information

Contact Info for Customer:

Dr. William Keene
Senior Epidemiologist
State Of Oregon Department of Human Services, Adult and Communicable Disease Program
503-731-4024
william.e.keene@state.or.us
http://www.dhs.state.or.us/publichealth/acd/index.cfm


Filemaker Contact:

Kevin Mallon
Public Relations Manager
FileMaker Inc.
408-987-7227
kevin_mallon@filemaker.com
http://www.filemaker.com


Overview
  • An Oregon Department of Human Services program devoted to tracking, investigating, and controlling the spread of communicable disease
  • Based in Portland, OR
  • Approximately 40 employees
Industry
  • Government
Solutions
  • Track and manage over 70,000 individual disease reports, including calculated fields and layouts
  • Track outbreak investigations
  • Process questionnaire data
Benefits
  • Improved accessibility to information, internally and externally
  • Increased savings realized by not having to hire outside consultants to develop data management systems
  • Faster, more efficient development without the need for workarounds