GNU Health/First Steps

Terminology
Before we start the implementation process, it is important to get familiar with the terminology commonly used in the rest of this
book. At the beginning some words might be a bit puzzling, but with a bit of practice, you will find this terminology quite logical.

First you should know that GNU Health builds upon other software. Even if you are not a technical personal, it might be helpful to
understand that GNU Health is an extension to Tryton, a general enterprise resource planning system (or ERP for short) for almost
any type of company or organisation. Tryton is developed in the Python programming language, and it stores all its data in a
PostgreSQL database.

The following concepts are essential to understand how GNU Health works:

Party: In GNU Health, a party is an entity. An abstract concept to define

someone or something that has legal status. It's the unit of the
relationship in Tryton. Some examples of Parties are:

Patients
Companies
Health professionals
Health centers

Model: The model defines each object in GNU Health. Models define
the database objects (tables).gnuhealth.patient is a model example.
Company. An example of a Party
Field: The building blocks of the model. For example:age and sex are
gnuhealth.patient fields.

View: Views are the representation of the model on the screen. Most models will have an individual form to accept
data into the model and display data out from the model.

Tree: The list format of the model. The tree view allow us to searchselect multiple records.
Form: The representation of the model on the screen that allows you
to input data.

Table: The model representation at the database server. The model

gnuhealth.patient is mapped in the tablegnuhealth_patient in
postgreSQL.

Record: Each unique entry in a particular database table. For example

Ana Betz is a record on the gnuhealth_patient table in PostgreSQL.
Example of a Tree list
Module: Modules are programs that provide specific functionality. GNU
Health provides different modules to meet your health center needs.
Example of modules areSocioeconomics, Genetics and Surgery. You
should only install the modules that are actually needed for your center
.

Report: Reports allows you to dynamically print documents in Open

Document / LibreOffice format (ODF), Portable Document Format (PDF)
or even directly to the printer.

Action: Actions are processes excecuted upon one or more selected

records.

Notebook: A tabbed group of forms designed to make navigation easier

. Form view of the same record

Navigation Area
Now is time to identify the components of the GNU Health Screen. In the following
screenshot we have marked the main sections :

GNU Health modular design

Main Menu : We can navigate among the different functionalities.

Configuration, Patients, Financial, ... Y
ou can deactivate the main menu
(useful in low resolution devices) by pressingCtrl+T
Tabs : Tryton allows you to have multiple recordsopen at the same
time. The section "Tabs" of the screenshot shows the current form.
Actions : Under the Tabs section you will find different icons that act
upon the current record. You can, for instance, create a new record,
generate a report, change the view, select related records associated to
this patient (appointments, lab tests... ).
Record form : This is where you see and input the information. Notice
that you can have tabbed forms (notebooks) in the lower half of the
form, which allows quick and easy navigation. In this example some of
the tabs within the records are main, medication, diseases, surgeries,
Sample Lab report
socioeconomics and gynecological information. The upper side of this
form is static, so the health professional has the most relevant
information about the patient always visible.
Status bar : The lower side of the screen shows the status bar . From left to right, these are fields :

User name : In this case we logged in asAdministrator

Organization Name : GNU Solidario Hospital
Requests : Tryton has an internal messaging system. Y ou will get notifications in realtime.
Server Information : The lower right section gives you login and server information. In this example, it shows
"admin@localhost:8000/demo".admin is the login name, localhost the name of the GNU Health server, 8000 is
the port where connects anddemo is the database name.

Form fields and field types

Let's now go through the most relevant field types and how to properly use them. We will use the previous screenshot of the patient
as the example.

Text fields : These type of fields allow us to enter a lot of information. oYu will see them normally like large boxes. In
our example, the field under "Patient Allergies and Critical Information" is a text field.
Character fields : These type of fields are similar to the Text fields, but with a limited size. There are few character
fields and none in this example. Thediet type in the lifestyle section or the Gene ID on genetics are example for
character fields.
Date Fields : These fields will open a calendar when clicked, so you can choose the date. Alternatively , you can
enter the date manually. The date of birth is a Date field.
DateTime Fields : Similar to the date fields, but with the addition of time. An example of this field is the Date/time of
birth of the newborn, in the neonatology module.
Integer fields : These fields allow only integer numbers. They show a "0" by default. An example is Minutes of
physical exercise per day
Float fields : You can enter decimal numbers. Thebody temperature is one example of a float field.
Function fields : These are special fields, in the sense that they are calculated in real time, depending, most of the
time, on the values of other fields. For example, thePatient Age is a function field. Notice that the field has a grey
 background, meaning that isread-only. It will calculate the current patient age in years/months/days depending on
the patient date of birth. Another example of function field is theHospitalization Status of the patient.
Selection fields : These fields will let you choose from a list of options. For example, the patient Sex or the blood
type are selection fields. This type of field minimizes typing error
.
Relational fields : These fields retrieve information from a related model. They are of the form One2Many or
Many2One. Relational fields are important to keep the uniqueness of data. By using this type of fields, you link the ID
of an existing record, without duplicating information, to another record. The patient is a relational (One2Many) field.
It relates to the party model, from where it gets all the administrative data (Social security number , address, etc... ).

Shortcuts : [F2] will open the related record and [F3] will create a new record

Required fields : These fields are mandatory. You must enter information or else the record won't be save d. You
can quickly identify the required fields because they have a blue background. The
Patient field is a required field.

Time to Practice
Important : Make sure you are in your demo database. This demo database that you created has no important information. You can
put anything you want. You can even delete it and recreate it. Just make sure you don't use a production database for your tests. One
way to prevent accidentally entering the production database is to have a different password for your demo database, this way if you
select the wrong database, you won't be able to login.

If you do not have a demo database yet, please refer to the chapter Different ways to test GNU Health to learn how to create your
own testing environment.

It's been a lot of information! Now is time to play around with all this information.

With the information try the following :

1. Navigate in the Main menu

2. Open the Configuration Submenu
3. Create a Physician with the Family Medicine Specialty
.

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This page was last edited on 16 July 2018, at 02:23.

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