Original Specification

The current state of Swine Flu in UK is alarming and the government urgently needs a database system to record all confirmed cases in England, Wales and Scotland. This database will be used by GPs, Councils and Government for a number of different purposes. Your task is to investigate and define requirements based on the following user requirements.

• Ability to record and retrieve personal details (name, address, age, etc….) for each patient.
• Ability to record and retrieve confirmed and suspected cases per city and region.
• Ability to identify person's GP and also details of the person's latest overseas travel, any serious underlying health issues.
• Ability to identify if any patients are related; and if more than one person in a family has suffered.

Additional Requirements

• Ability to record the Swine Flu vaccine's effect on infection rates per batch.
• Ability for a GP to identify the number of their patients that have contracted Swine Flu over the past week, two weeks, month etc.
• Ability for a Primary Care Trust to create lists of names and addresses of suspected cases and distribute them to the relevant GP for follow-up.
• Ability for the government to retrieve trends for confirmed cases over the past weeks, months etc.
• Ability to identify the number of cases within specified age groups.
• Ability to identify how long a patient has had Swine Flu
• Ability to identify which ethnic groups have been most affected
• Ability to record and retrieve the details of any patient who had died after contracting Swine Flu

Additional Background Information

The first illness caused by a new Influenza A virus was confirmed in the UK on the 27 April 2009. Since then the virus has become much more common in this country and globally with the World Health Organisation declaring a pandemic on 11 June 2009. This is the first influenza pandemic since the 1968-1970 outbreak. A Swine Flu pandemic will have considerable impact across communities, organisations and service providers.

Swine flu vaccination has started, with the first doses being offered to people with the greatest risk of becoming seriously ill from the virus. New cases of swine flu in the week to October 22 were estimated at 53,000, up from 27,000 the week before.

The latest figures for England, released by the Chief Medical Officer, show that hospitalisation rates have also risen, with 506 people needing treatment. Of those, 99 have needed critical care, the greatest number so far.

The UK also saw a further 16 swine flu deaths, bringing the total to 122 since the virus first appeared; 93 in England, 15 in Scotland, eight in Northern Ireland and six in Wales.

The figures came as manufacturers delivered the first batches of swine flu vaccine, allowing the vaccination programme to begin.

Assumptions

• A patient can only have Swine Flu once.
• A patient will be registered with no more than one GP.
• Patients will be added to the database either by a GP at vaccination (i.e. no case) or by the NHS hotline.
• Patients cannot be uniquely identified using a National Insurance number.This is due to the fact that National Insurance numbers are not distributed until a person's 16th birthday.
• Not every patient on the system will have been to see a GP.
• Should a GP fall ill they will be classified as a patient.
• A GP involved in vaccination may not have patients
• A GP may not be involved in the vaccination program
• A GP has to confirm a case
• A GP has to administer a vaccine
• A patient may not have any relatives in the database
• There cannot be a case of Swine Flu without there being a patient
• A vaccine cannot be administered to nobody
• Latest overseas travel includes any destination visited by a patient in the past 3 months

Conceptual Design Stage