Using On-Line Analytical Processing (OLAP) and Data Mining to Estimate Emergency Room Activity in DoD Medical Treatment Facilities in the Tricare Central Region

摘要

On-line Analytical Processing (OLAP) and data mining can greatly enhance the ability of the Military Medical Treatment Facility (MTF) emergency room (ER) manager to improve ER staffing and utilization. MTF ER managers use statistical data analysis to help manage the efficient operation and use of ERs. As the size and complexity of databases increase, traditional statistical analysis becomes limited in the amount and type of information it can extract. OLAP tools enable the analysis of multi-dimensional data, which can give the user access to previously undiscovered information. Data mining has the capability to break large sets of data down into groups by classifications, associations, and clusterings to transform previously meaningless data into useful information. This research presents a brief overview of the DoD medical system, OLAP, and data mining. OLAP and data mining tools then analyze a data set containing two years of MTF ER data from the TRICARE Central Region. The results of these analyses provide insight on the predictive ca abilities, advantages, and disadvantages of applying OLAP and data mining to MTF ER data.