First-year students in the UAB School of Health Professions’ Master of Science in Health Informatics (MSHI) program, placed second in the Mendix Student App Contest. The students – Enyonam Kpomblekou-Ademawou, John Opeyemi Adedeji Fadimiroye, John Hosmer, Carole Richardson and Alana Stewart – participated in the contest as part of a class assignment in “HI 600: Analysis and Design of Health Information Systems” taught by Bunyamin Ozaydin, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Department of Health Services Administration.
Ozaydin says this team performed beyond the assignment requirements to create an app for which to be proud.
“This year is the second time we integrated Mendix low-code development environment into this course, and it has improved the way we deliver systems analysis and design,” said Ozaydin. “Our students’ exceptional performance in applying it to the class projects validates our claim that what they learn in the program prepares them well for a successful career in the health informatics industry.
Using synthetic external data, the five MSHI students created a Computerized Physician Order Entry (CPOE) system. The CPOE was designed with four roles – physician, pharmacist, pharmacy tech and nurse – based on a unique set of parameters.
“The most challenging part of this experience was combining theoretical and practical knowledge with creativity,” said Kpomblekou-Ademawou. “The application would not have come about as smoothly if the group did not have various experience levels with health information systems and go through the systems development life system ourselves.”
The Mendix Student App Contest scoring criteria included User Experience, User Design, Bug Free App, Business Complexity, Business Use Case, and Technical Integrations. The system developed by the students had various layers of data integration and complexity. All judges scored the UAB-developed app as appropriate and bug free.
“Dr. Ozaydin’s course dedicated weeks to focus on the iterative and rigorous nature of systems development life cycles and this required many phases of development and testing to name a few,” said Kpomblekou-Ademawou. “I was glad that I was able to experience this, but I am even more proud to have been able to work with future healthcare leaders that were very driven and passionate to make the application a real depiction of a computer physician order entry (CPOE), rather than sticking to a theoretical system.”
The UAB MSHI program is primarily online and includes working adults from all over the U.S. In addition to the experience with application development, these students also had to work with each other remotely in order to successfully complete the assignment.
The MSHI program at UAB is accepting applications through June 1 for a Fall 2020 start. APPLY NOW
