Foreword

Why is this book needed?

This book is the book I wish I'd had available to me back in about 2011 when I started getting back interested in code and clinical informatics.

I'd been a 'computery nerd type' at high school and sixth-form college, but I didn't touch computers much from 1995 to about 2002. I got a laptop in 2002 but I only used it for email and web and to write revision notes for the various medical exams I was doing at the time.

When I was doing GP training, between 2008 and 2011, I started to get more interested in the computers we were using clinically. In particular I was surprised and disappointed that the amazing computerised GP systems I'd heard so much about when I was in hospital medicine turned out not to really be all that great in reality.

Once I started getting more interested in technology, I began to ask around for how you would learn more about the GP systems and how they could be made better. There was virtually nothing. No books, and nothing at all on the internet. Not even any real forums, unless you counted the GP System User groups, which even then were starting to fade into insignificance as the problems GPs faced were less about their own system and more about the interactions of that system with the wider NHS - e-Referrals, e-Prescribing, and more.

How this book works

Within this book I'm not going to attempt to duplicate any of the great web-based tutorials and learning platforms that are already out there. Instead I'm going to signpost you to the best ones I know of.

If you find better ones or problems with the ones I'm recommending then please create an Issue in Github or email me