Designing the Master Index Database

In designing the database, there are several factors to consider, such as the volume of data stored in the database and the number of transactions processed by the database daily. The master index database should be created in its own tablespaces. The following sections describe some of the analyses to perform along with considerations to take into account when designing the database.

Designing for Performance Optimization

The Oracle and SQL Server installation guides provide detailed information about installing the database software for optimal performance. Both database platforms include guides containing information about monitoring and fine-tuning your database, including tuning memory, swap space, I/O, CPU usage, block and file size, and so on. You should be familiar with these concepts prior to creating the database.

Data Structure Analysis

Before defining the object structure, you analyzed the structure of the legacy data to help you define the object structure and the attributes of each field. You can use this data analysis to determine the amount of data that will be stored in the database, which will help you size the master index database and decide how to best distribute the database. Knowing the volume of existing data plus the expected daily transaction volume will help you plan the requirements of the database server, such as networking needs, disk space, memory, swap space, and so on.

The data structure analysis also helps you determine the processing codes and descriptions to enter in the common tables (described below), and should help you determine any default values that have been entered into certain fields that could skew the matching probability weights.

Common Table Data

Common table data analysis involves gathering information about the abbreviations used for specific data elements in each sending system, such as system codes and codes for certain attributes of the patients in your database, such as language, race, and marital status codes. The processing codes and their descriptions are stored in a set of database tables known as common maintenance tables. The master index project includes a script to help you load the processing codes into the database.

When an enterprise object appears on the Patient EDM, the master index application translates the processing codes defined in the common tables into their descriptions so the user is not required to decipher each code. The data elements stored in the common maintenance tables are also used to populate the drop-down lists that appear for certain fields in the Patient EDM. Users can select from these options to populate the associated fields.

User Code Data

User code data analysis involves gathering information about the abbreviations used for specific data elements in each sending system for a field whose format or possible values are constrained by a separate field. For example, if you store credit card information, you might have a drop-down list in the Credit Card field for each credit card type. The format of the field that stores the credit card number is dependent on the type of credit card you select. You could also use user code data to validate cities with postal codes. The abbreviations and related constraint information are stored in the sbyn_user_code table. A sample script, Create User Code Data, is provided to help you insert data into this table.

Database Considerations

When you create the master index database, you need to consider several factors, such as sizing, distribution, indexes, and extents. By default, all of the master index database tables for an Oracle database are installed in the system tablespace. You should install the master index tables in different tablespaces, depending on the original size and expected volume of the database. For SQL Server, the master index tables belong to “dbo” by default.

Database Sizing

To begin the database installation, you first create an Oracle or SQL Server database instance using the provided configuration tools. Use the tools provided by Oracle or Microsoft to define the tablespace and extent sizing for the database.

Database Distribution

When you create the database instance, you can define the distribution of your system tables, data tables, rollback logs, dump files, control files, and so on. Use internal policies regarding relational database distribution to determine how to best distribute your master index database.

Database Indexes

By default, indexes are defined for the following tables: sbyn_appl, sbyn_common_header, sbyn_common_detail, sbyn_enterprise, sbyn_transaction, sbyn_assumedmatch, sbyn_potentialduplicates, sbyn_audit, and sbyn_merge. Index scripts are also created for indexing the fields included in the default blocking query in the Candidate Select file. You can create additional indexes against the database to optimize the searching and matching processes. At a minimum, it is recommended that all combinations of fields used for blocking or matching be indexed. For each query block defined in the blocking query, create an index containing the fields in that block.

The following indexes are automatically created to improve performance when running large reports from the command line or Patient EDM.

CREATE INDEX SBYN_POTENTIALDUPLICATES3 ON SBYN_POTENTIALDUPLICATES (TRANSACTIONNUMBER ASC);

CREATE INDEX SBYN_ASSUMEDMATCH2 ON SBYN_ASSUMEDMATCH (TRANSACTIONNUMBER ASC);

CREATE INDEX SBYN_TRANSACTION4 on SBYN_TRANSACTION (EUID2 ASC, TIMESTAMP ASC);

CREATE INDEX SBYN_TRANSACTION3 on SBYN_TRANSACTION (TIMESTAMP ASC, TRANSACTIONNUMBER ASC);

Note - To improve performance, these four indexes should be dropped prior to performing an initial load or batch load of data. They can be recreated once the load is complete if you are running the provided reports.