Tufts academic health information network: concept and scenario.

Tufts University School of Medicine's new health sciences education building, the Arthur M. Sackler Center for Health Communications, will house a modern medical library and computer center, classrooms, auditoria, and media facilities. The building will also serve as the center for an information and communication network linking the medical school and adjacent New England Medical Center, Tufts' primary teaching hospital, with Tufts Associated Teaching Hospitals throughout New England. Ultimately, the Tufts network will join other gateway networks, information resource facilities, health care institutions, and medical schools throughout the world. The center and the network are intended to facilitate and improve the education of health professionals, the delivery of health care to patients, the conduct of research, and the implementation of administrative management approaches that should provide more efficient utilization of resources and save dollars. A model and scenario show how health care delivery and health care education are integrated through better use of information transfer technologies by health information specialists, practitioners, and educators.