Agile Software Development with Open Source Software in a Hospital Environment - Case Study of an eCRF-System for Orthopaedical Studies

摘要

In recent years, agile development of web-based applications as well as open-source software (OSS) have been subject to research and practiced application in many domains. For the healthcare sector, the use of OSS has been studied in the literature with contradicting findings. Regarding OSS in clinical applications, mainly case studies from hospital-wide IS have been reported. Agile methods have been examined merely in the context of healthcare software product development. However, the development of web-based applications in clinical departments using agile methods and OSS has not been studied so far. Thus, in this paper the feasibility of such an approach is examined for an electronic case report form (eCRF) application for orthopaedical studies. It is demonstrated how OSS-based web engineering projects may be successfully accomplished in highly specialized environments like clinical departments by properly taking into account their specific requirements.