OpenMRS Oncology Platforms -- Possibilities for Collaboration and/or a Future Module

Hello all,

I posted this on the implementer forum, but thought I would try here as well. I am a second-year medical student at Harvard and am interested in learning about current and/or future implementations of OpenMRS for oncology.

So far I have been able to gather the following:

  1. Partners in Health currently has some basic oncology functionality for their cancer hospital in Rwanda that is a mixture of data forms, the Reporting module, and a customization of the OrderExension module that allows for the complexity of chemotherapy regimens.
  2. I also believe that RG Kar Hospital for Oncology and Radiation Oncology implemented OpenMRS, but I am unsure of the extent to which oncology-specific functionality was created beyond adding concept dictionary terms.
  3. Andrew Miller of University of Wollongong’s Graduate School of Medicine has previously looked for others interested in using OpenMRS for oncology, specifically for radiation oncology, but I don’t know if he was able to connect with any collaborators.
  4. The Active Projects page has outlined an OpenMRS design for chemotherapy regimens.
  5. Finally, it is my understanding that AMPATH has embarked upon comprehensive cancer care in Kenya. I would be curious to know if this cancer-related work included creating any new OpenMRS functionality.

Has anyone else attempted or successfully used OpenMRS for oncology? Is there interest out there in the community to have functionality for chemotherapy ordering or for other features specific to cancer-care?

There are free oncology platforms available online for cancer care currently, such as St. Jude’s POND (pediatrics) and Memorial Sloan-Kettering’s CAISIS programs, however there does not appear to be a free solution that can be integrated into a broader system like OpenMRS. In terms of coordinating, tracking, and evaluating cancer care in locations such as Haiti (where OpenMRS is already used), it seems it would be valuable to have functionality specifically for oncology – and perhaps even to eventually have a more generalizeable module that could one day be integrated into the Reference Application, allowing for ongoing collaboration.

Looking forward to hearing about any potential work on this front or general thoughts that the community has.

Sincerely,

Sean L