High-quality Information Systems Research Articles

Do system quality and information quality affect job performance? The mediation role of users' perceptions.

This study aims to analyze the influence of the system quality and information quality from the Correctional Database System (CDS) on the job performance of correctional Technical Support Officers (TSO) in Sumatra, either directly or through the mediating role of perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness. This study tested 118 correctional officers selected by the purposive sampling technique. A quantitative approach is used with Partial Least Square-Structural Equation Modeling analysis technique. It was found that the direct influence of the system and information quality on job performance is insignificant. Nonetheless, it shows that perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness fully mediate system quality and information quality on job performance. The findings demonstrate that perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness are important factors that motivate individual performance when supported by high-quality information systems. This study provides an overview of the use of a mandatory system for public organizations and the effects on user performance. It can be used as a basis for correctional institutions to strengthen and maintain a positive perception of CDS among their officers, such as through mentoring programs.

Information systems quality in management accounting and management control effectiveness

PurposeSeveral conceptual works suggest that more digitalized information systems in management accounting have the potential to make this corporate function more effective. Against this backdrop, this study aims to investigate the impact of information systems quality in management accounting on the effectiveness of management control systems. Additionally, this study examines the moderating effect of process automation.Design/methodology/approachA cross-sectional survey of 125 German Mittelstand firms and hierarchical regression analyses were used for data collection and analysis.FindingsThe findings confirm the assumed positive effect of information systems quality in management accounting on management control effectiveness. They also confirm the assumed moderating effect of process automation. The authors find that the relationship between information systems quality in management accounting and management control effectiveness is more pronounced if the firm features a higher degree of process automation.Originality/valueSeveral earlier case studies and a few quantitative studies indicated the potentially positive effect of high-quality information systems in management accounting on management control effectiveness. To the best of the authors‘ knowledge, this study is among the first to deliver quantitative proof of this relationship in the context of German Mittelstand firms. Moreover, the authors add to this literature the moderating effect of process automation in the relationship between information systems quality in management accounting and management control effectiveness.

Six Inversion Strategies for Avoiding Rejection in Academic Publishing: Lessons from the IS Discipline

The publication process in many academic disciplines, including in Information Systems (IS), can seem arduous and unpredictable, particularly for early career researchers. While the literature offers plentiful guidance on how to pursue publication acceptance, this paper offers a crisp summary of common mistakes that lead to rejection and provides six actionable inversion strategies for avoiding them. Namely, when preparing a paper, we recommend you (1) abstain from methodological promiscuity and (2) never overclaim (but try not to underclaim either); When submitting a paper, it is a good idea to (3) steer clear of bootlicking and (3) avoid sloppiness; and, after receiving the reviews, you should (5) forego belligerence, and (6) stop flogging a dead horse. These inversion strategies can help early career researchers better navigate the review process, increasing the chances of their papers maturing, and helping to avoid mistakes that lower the chance of publishing in high-quality IS journals.

Sustainable development of territories as a basis for the integrated management of urban development for the effective use of the territory of municipalities

The relevance of the research work is primarily determined by the necessity to avoid the consequences that were clearly exposed by the urban planning policy of the past years, associated with the solution of current problems without taking into account the acceptance of interest from the population. Currently, the Russian Federation adheres to a strategic social document, which is a territorial scheme, covered by all the necessary conditions for life, which include not only passive prediction of the future, but also active assistance in its formation in a positive and optimistic manner, as well as for real goals and in reachable direction. The creation of an effective tool for managing the development of the territory, in accordance with the Federal Law and the legislation of the constituent entity of the Russian Federation, is the goal of sustainable development of territories. After the adoption of the design decisions of the master plans, the basis for resolving issues in a comprehensive manner is identified, including the organization of planning structures, territorial and infrastructural development of settlements, socio-economic development, and also includes the development of rules for land use and development and the establishment of a legal regime for the use of territorial zones, determining future areas of investment development, taking into account high-quality software based on all modern requirements for the formation of a high-quality information system to meet all the needs of urban development.

Construction of Project Management Using Information System

Information is playing a vital role of every concerns project management processes. The activities of organization’s project management, desires to attain an excellent flow of information. This task can be done through to build a high quality information system to that concern. This paper concentrates the present status of information systems in the function of construction project management for the huge corporation and government agencies in Saudi Arabia. The innovative conceptual model names as Information System Success (ISS) is built to obtain the barriers of information system in project constructions as well as independent variables are introduced. With the assistance of ISS model, the researcher can create a survey to verify the achievement of the information system and the autonomous variables that influence the information system within the population data. The results will explain the improvements of Saudi Arabia’s large corporation government agencies construction project. Moreover, the result indicates that the independent variables have focusing the effect of the information system such as IT infrastructure, organizational competence along with management support.

Bibliographic Measures of Top-Tier Finance, Information Systems, and Management Science Journals

Purpose: Faculty research is frequently the basis of pay, tenure, and promotion decisions in the university arena. Meanwhile, perceptions regarding the quantity and quality of the research produced by a faculty is often the basis of departmental, college, and university reputation. The journal in which research findings are published is often used to assess the overall research quality. In order to better benchmark journal quality, this report provides findings of a meticulous investigation of leading journals in the finance, information systems and management science disciplines. It examines four different citation-based measures of quality and four journal characteristics that are exogenous to the quality of any individual piece of research. In unison, these investigative paths provide a clearer understanding of journal quality across the business realm, and hence of the quality of research appearing in business journals. Design: This study assists in the development of an accurate perception regarding business research through a careful analysis of the popular Journal Citation Reports (JCR) impact factor across leading journals in three diverse business disciplines. By considering three newer journal quality metrics, a.) SCImago Journal Rank (SJR), b.) Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP), and c.) Percentage of articles cited, this research builds on past research. Top-tier journals in finance, information systems, and operations research and management science (referred to here as “management science ”) are compared to evaluate the consistency of these measures across disciplines. The differences in journal characteristics and their impact on the citation-rate based measures of quality are also analyzed. Further, the potential impact of a discipline-based variation in the acceptance rate, issue frequency, the time since journal inception, and total reviewers are put forth as additional potential exogenous factors that may influence the perception of the overall journal quality. T-tests are applied for discipline comparisons, while correlation and multiple regression are employed in the analysis of journal characteristics. Findings: There is a significant difference in the JCR impact measures of high-quality finance and management science journals versus high-quality information systems journals. However, only the JCR measures for finance journals correlate with a variety of journal-specific factors, including the journal's acceptance rate and frequency of issue. The SJR measures for finance and management science journals are, on the other hand, consistently higher than information systems journals, though the SJR value of any individual journal can be quite volatile. Most importantly, finance and management journals also report significant relations between the

Use of human resources information system in agricultural companies in the Czech Republic

High-quality information systems explicitly focused on working with people help companies meet the increasingly complex requirements for registration of attendance, forms, employment contracts, and much more. The article's main goal is to identify areas of human resources management for which agricultural companies in the Czech Republic use information systems to increase the efficiency of processes and evaluate the development of their usage with regard to the support of digitisation. The data, which were subjected to factor analysis, were obtained via a questionnaire survey from selected 70 agricultural companies in the Czech Republic and via qualitative research (focus group, n = 7). The largest share of monitored agricultural holdings is using IT systems in the area of personal data, while the smallest share of monitored agricultural holdings is using software for monitoring education and knowledge transfer. Factor analysis identified 4 factors that characterise agricultural companies according to the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) in human resource management. The results show that in terms of the current shift of the entire agriculture towards digitisation, the use of ICT in staff management of companies cannot be neglected. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbates the use of ICT.

ERP-Based Accounting Information System Implementation in Organization: A Study in Riau, Indonesia

In the accounting information system implementation, the users should consider the benefits and advantages of the system. This paper examines the effect of the Enterprise Resources Planning based (ERP-based) accounting information system implementation on user impact and organizational impact. The population in this study is companies listed on the Indonesian Stock Exchange, especially companies based in Riau, Indonesia. These companies currently use the ERP-based accounting information system. Research samples are employees who use the ERP-based accounting information system. For data analysis, we use structural equation modeling (SEM). Based on data analysis, high-quality information system implementation generate high-quality information that can give satisfaction to the user. Moreover, the information system is related to user skill, satisfaction, and knowledge sharing which improve personal skills; enhanced personal skill contributes to organizational performance. On the other hand, there is no effect of training on personal skills and there is no effect of information quality on perceived usefulness. This research gives implication to the organization for implementing a high-quality ERP-based accounting information system that positively impacts organizational performance. Future research is expected to examine information system implementation in different research objects and conditions.

A Meta-Analysis of Emotion and Cognition in Information System

The current research on the information systems (IS) shows that emotion and cognition can affect behavior, but their interaction with each other is not clear. This paper attempts to clarify the interaction between emotion and cognition and explain their antecedents and consequences. This research includes a meta-analysis composed of 33 papers related to emotion and cognition in high-quality IS journals. Results reveal cognition affects emotion when emotion can be changed or manipulated by an external stimulus, and emotion can be attributed to a combination of multiple cognitive appraisals. By contrast, emotion affects cognition when it involves the use of information technology and focuses on intuitive interface design features and stable personality traits. The authors contribute to the literature with a more comprehensive summary of antecedents and consequences of emotion and cognition and provide practical implications for enterprises to understand consumer behavior from the perspective of the interaction between emotion and cognition.

Low system quality and job strain hamper information system benefits in nursing

Abstract Background Health information systems (HIS) have been widely adopted in nursing to increase the efficiency and safety of patient care. Previous studies have shown that low HIS quality is a barrier to obtaining such benefits from HIS use. The association between HIS quality and HIS benefits has not, however, been studied taking into account the characteristics of the work environment, such as job strain. This study examined the joint associations of HIS quality and job strain with the perceived patient care-related benefits of HIS use in nursing. Methods Cross-sectional survey data of 2707 Finnish registered nurses were used to examine the associations of two indicators of HIS quality (ease of use and technical quality) and job strain with the benefits of HIS use. Missing data were addressed with multiple imputation and linear regression was used to examine the associations. All analyses were adjusted for age, gender, and employment sector. Results Together with the covariates, HIS quality explained 14% to 20% of the variance in the perceived benefits of HIS use. The additional variance explained by job strain was only 1%. HIS quality in terms of ease of use interacted with job strain in predicting HIS benefits. Nurses who found HIS difficult to use and experienced high job strain reported the lowest benefits from HIS use. By contrast, nurses who found HIS easy to use considered HIS beneficial for improving patient care even if they experienced high job strain. Conclusions The results suggest that healthcare organizations should focus on ensuring good HIS quality to improve patient care through HIS use in nursing. Exposure to job strain may intensify the association between low HIS quality and lower patient care-related benefits from HIS use. HIS with good quality seem to improve patient care even in a high-strain work environment. Key messages Nurses who work with low-quality health information systems and experience job strain perceive the systems least beneficial for improving patient care. High-quality information systems, by contrast, are perceived to improve patient care even in a high-strain work environment.

QUALITY PARAMETERS OF INFORMATION SYSTEMS FOR BUSINESS IN THE CONTEXT OF DIGITAL TRANSFORMATIONS

The article provides a refined definition of “information system for business” as a coordinated set of material, non-material and human re-sourses components that is used to implement a set of procedures of form¬ing an information resource as a quality product that meets the needs of ex¬ternal and internal users. According to the study, information technologies play a key role in the modern business environment. Many economic enti¬ties carry out their economical activities exclusively bye using communica¬tion-digital networks and functional software which provide the infor-mation necessary for effective business management. Resently, it has been proven that the communication and information technologies have become an integral part of any modern information systems, since they increase the level of business competitiveness during use the operational management information on time.These information technologies ensure the work’s continuity of information systems for a long period of time with the possi¬bility of quick adaptation of the business to the digital transformation’s conditions, which reduce the formation’s cost of information resources.The role of such components of information technology as software, databases and computer networks, which, in turn, are key components of high-quality information systems, is disclosed.

Bibliographic measures of top-tier finance and information systems journals

Purpose Pay, tenure and promotion decisions are frequently based upon inferences regarding the value of faculty research. Meanwhile, departmental, college and university reputations are frequently based on perceptions regarding the quality of research being produced by its faculty. Making correct inferences requires accurate measurement of research quality, which is often based upon the journal through which results are shared. This research expands upon the research found elsewhere through its detailed investigation of leading journals in two business disciplines, including examination of four different citation-based measures and four journal characteristics which are exogenous to the quality of any individual piece of research. The paper aims to discuss this issue. Design/methodology/approach This study assists in the development of an accurate perspective regarding research quality, by studying the popular Journal Citation Reports (JCR) impact factor. A further expansion on the past literature is consideration of three newer journal quality metrics: SCImago Journal Rank (SJR), Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP) and percentage of articles cited. Top-tier journals in finance and information systems are compared to evaluate the consistency of these measures across disciplines. Differences in journal characteristics and their impact on citation-rate based measures of quality are also examined. The potential impact of discipline-based variation in acceptance rate, issue frequency, the time since journal inception and total reviewers are put forth as additional potential exogenous factors that may impact the perception of journal quality. t-Tests are employed for discipline comparisons, while correlation and multiple regression are used for journal characteristic analysis. Findings There is a significant difference in the JCR impact measures of high-quality finance journals vs high-quality information systems journals, which are correlated with a variety of journal-specific factors including the journal’s acceptance rate and frequency of issue. Information systems journals domination of finance journals persists whether one considers mean, median, minimum or maximum impact factors. SJR measures for finance journals are consistently higher than information systems journals, though the SJR value of any individual journal can be quite volatile. By comparison, the SNIP metric rates premier information systems journals higher. Over 12 percent more of the articles in leading information systems journals are cited during the initial three years. Research limitations/implications Logical extensions of this research include examining journals in other business disciplines. One could also evaluate quality measures reaction to variation in journal characteristics (i.e. changes in acceptance rates). Furthermore, one could include other measures of journal quality, including the recently released CiteScore metric. Such research will build on the present research and improve the accuracy of research quality assessment. Practical implications To the extent that citation-based research measures and journal-specific factors vary across disciplines as demonstrated by our investigation, discipline-specific traits should be considered adjusted for, when making inferences about the long-term value of recently published research. For instance, finance faculty publishing in journals with JCR readings of 2.0 are in journals that are 53 percent above the discipline’s average, while information systems faculty publishing in journals with JCR readings of 2.0 are in journals that are 18 percent below the discipline’s average. Furthermore, discipline-specific differences in journal characteristics, leading to differences in citation-based quality measures, should be considered when making inferences about the long-term value of recently published research in the process of making recommendations regarding salary adjustments, retention and promotion. Social implications Quantity and quality of research are two hallmarks of leading research institutions. Assessing research quality is very problematic because its definition has changed from being based on review process (i.e. blind refereed), to acceptance rates, to impact factors. Furthermore, the impact factor construct has been a lightning rod of controversy as researchers, administrators and journals themselves argue over which metric to employ. This research is attempting to assess how impact factors and journal characteristics may influence the impact factors, and how these interactions vary business discipline. The research is especially important and relevant to the authors which separately chair departments including finance and information systems faculty, and therefore are in roles requiring assessment of faculty research productivity including quality. Originality/value This study is a detailed analysis of bibliographic aspects of the top-tier journals in two quantitative business areas. In addition to the popular JCR, SJR and SNIP measures of performance, the analysis studies the seldom-examined percentage of the article cited metric. A deeper understanding of citation-based measures is obtained though the evaluation of changes in how journals have been rated on these metrics over time. The research shows that there are discipline-related systematic differences in both citation-based research measures and journal-specific factors and that these discipline-specific traits should be considered when making inferences about the long-term value of recently published research. Furthermore, discipline-specific difference in journal characteristics, leading to differences in citation-based quality measures, should be considered when making personnel and remuneration decisions.

A Comparison of High-Quality Finance Journals and High-Quality Information Systems Journals

Journal reputation is often used as a surrogate for research quality when making decisions on retention, tenure, and promotion. This research adds to the bibliometric literature in the business arena by identifying key journal characteristics that differentiate journal quality by comparing key differences in high-quality finance and information systems journals. The potential impact of discipline-based variation in frequency of issue, journal sustainability over time, total reviewers, county of origin, and journal review process are put forth as potential exogenous factors that may impact the perception of journal quality. To the extent that these factors vary across disciplines, as demonstrated by our investigation of journals with the highest reputation in both disciplines, factors beyond the endogenous quality of the research should be considered when making inferences about research quality.

ISJ Editorial

ISJ Editorial

Social media research in the context of emerging markets

PurposeDespite the potential of social media in emerging markets (EMs), only a few studies published in high-quality information systems (IS) journals that have addressed issues related to social media in the context of EMs. The purpose of this paper is to analyse existing research related to social media published in high-quality IS journals for exploring initial research trends, emerging themes, limitations and future research directions in the context of EMs.Design/methodology/approachThis study conducted a systematic review of 22 articles on social media, which were published in the “Senior Scholars Basket of IS Journals and Information Systems Frontiers” from 1997 to 2017. Manual literature search approach (i.e. screening through the table of contents of each journal) was employed to identify relevant articles. The content of relevant articles was systematically analysed and synthesised along with keyword analysis to understand research trends on social media related issues in the EMs context.FindingsThe study identified four major themes from existing research on the social media in the context of EMs, namely: social media frameworks; social media and consumers; social media and organisations; and social media and society with the majority of the studies focussing on consumers. A single subject was found as the major limitation with studies analysed focussing on single platform/country/domain hindering the generalisability whereas including a new exogenous variable to improve the validity of existing studies emerged as main future research direction.Originality/valueThis study conducted literature review on social media in EMs, which have not been undertaken yet. Moreover, it employed manual search (an effort and time-intensive approach) to overcome the shortcomings of keyword search to identify, locate, select and analyse the social media literature in the context of EMs.

Methodology of effective monitoring of a soil cover (on the basis of the analysis of 25-years European experience)

The purpose of the article is to state the most essential methodological aspects of monitoring of a soil cover which is spent in the Europe during more than 25 years, to approach the Ukrainian model of monitoring to European and to formulate requirements to the organization of monitoring in Ukraine which will guarantee its efficiency. According to the European concept under monitoring the existential system of supervision over soil properties on constant platforms with use of the wide program of indicators with the purpose of creation of information-analytical databases, divisions into districts and allocation of problem territories, the forecast of soil development (including by means of pedotransfer modelling), a correcting of the contents and intensity of agricultural activity, planning of soil-saving actions, improvements of granting process to farmers, activization of work with mass media and in other purposes means. Advantage has regular distribution of points which meets the requirements of geostatistic analysis and geoinformatics is better and is better considers spatial features of soil characteristics which are important in mapping. Organizational principles of construction of monitoring: independence of departments influence; simple 2-unit structure (regional laboratory – the centre of information-analytical), the coordinated and approved normative estimated base; coordination with supervision over other components of an environment; financing from the state budget; regular informing on results power structures and the public. Monitoring is meaningful only when with its help a long number of the equidistant supervision received mainly in a regular network is formed. Only under these conditions probably objective estimation and the reliable forecast of negative changes in soils, and also contours of territories with problem characteristics are precisely defined. Accordingly means for their elimination are economically spent. Monitoring should be spent at the greatest possible quantity of definitions of display soil properties in modes in situ and on-line. Mainly by results of monitoring a soil cover in the majority of the European countries bases of a new agrarian policy protection of an environment and active support of soil-saving technologies to which interest increases in the European countries have been certain is. In the European countries the atmosphere of assistance to monitoring was generated and it is considered, that without high-quality information system about a soil cover to create comfortable conditions of a life and a clean environment is impossible. In Ukraine it is necessary to organize monitoring of a soil cover on the basis of the newest program, mathematical tool, and cartographical bases, agreed with the European experience. In connection with intensive use the soil cover of Ukraine quickly changes, the increasing urgency is got with processes of degradation. Therefore the control of changes and over its base formation of corresponding programs on stay of degradation and reproduction of soil fertility – very actual problem.

Mission Critical 공공 정보화 구축 시험평가 개선 지표 연구

Up until recently, Korea has ranked the first place in UN e-Government Survey for three consecutive years. In keeping with such accomplishment, the size of budget execution has been consistently growing in accordance with Korea's Government 3.0 policy and vision, leading to increase in big-sized informatization projects in the business. Especially in mission critical public sector's infrastructure where it affects many people, growing demand for establishing high-quality information system with new technologies being brought to attention in order to meet the complex needs of citizens. National defense information system, being one of representative domains examples in the concerned area, established high military competency by applying breakthrough technology. Network-oriented national defense knowledge informatization was set as the vision in order to implement core roles in making efficient national defense management; and effort has been made to materialize the vision by making advancement in national defense's information system and its informatization implementation system. This research studies new quality index relevant to test and evaluation (T&E)of informatization business in national defense which is the representative example of mission critical public sector's infrastructure. We studied international standards and guidelines, analyzed actual T&E cases, and applied them to the inspection items that are currently in use, complying with the e-government law (Act No. 12346, Official Announcement Date 2014. 1.28., Enforcement Date 2014. 7.29.) As a result of productivity analysis, based on hypothesis in which suggested model was applied to T&E of the national defense informatization business, we confirmed the possibility of enhancement in the T&E productivity by assessing reliability, expert ise, and safety as evaluation factors.

Creating Pathway for Enhancing Student Collection of Academic Records in Nigeria-a New Direction

Education is priceless and every academic institution needs to be very serious about its management and administration in order not to mess around with the students' academic headway. Therefore, there is need for them to significantly improve and incredibly convenient arrangement by which former students receive final academic transcripts. It is indeed a nightmare of unimaginable proportions to attempt to get academic records from some universities, especially in recent times. This is as a result of the administrative heedlessness of some record officials in the university. A request for an undergraduate transcript means the requestor sometime is expected to wait longer than expected with the hope of getting his results. This paper proposes a Transcript Xpress which will open new and convenient routes to key educational solutions to information, providing application service delivery and ensure that proper records are kept in tact. This will improve the university's efficiency and effectiveness through the provision of high quality information system and services. Transcript Xpress will be the catalyst for change through improved educational solutions.

Bridging the basic biomedical researches and clinical practices with biomedical informatics

The emergence of genome-wise high-throughput technologies have led to the creation of the interdisciplinary field between biotechnology and information technology, where bioinformatics came out. With the application of these technologies in medical research, the concept of has attracted more and more attentions and concerns. How can we translate the results of basic biomedical research into clinical practices? How should we promote basic research to meet the demands of modern medicine? These questions are the core issues in translational medicine. To solve these problems, information technology is the key. The integration and interaction among biotechnology, medicine and information technology leads to the formation of Biomedical Informatics. The challenges of building modern medical information systems are to reduce the redundancy of the data and functions, to seek the Inter-connection and Inter-communication technology for different data structures and system architectures in the complex business environment, and to build an efficient and flexible content management system. To meet these challenges, we need to build a high-quality information system integrating clinical data and basic biomedical research data, which is the core of translational medicine and the key to obtain the transformation “from the laboratory bench to hospital bed”. This information system should include three parts: de-identified clinical data repository (de-id CDR), “omics” databases including analysis platforms and tissue banks (diseases and normal controls) adhering to the requirements of research design. The health information technologies related to clinical data acquisition, storage, management, and applications are essential for the 21st century medical and health services. The automatic or semi-automatic form filling for research by importing and integrating data from different information systems, e.g. PACS, HIS, EMR and LIS, can significantly improve the data accuracy and work efficiency. However, in current medical information systems, a large number of important clinical data exist only in free text documents and reports. To extract these data, medical natural language processing technology has become a hot and challenging field in biomedical informatics research. The automatic processing of medical text in English has been studied for many years, and many tools have been developed. But in China, research on automatic processing of Chinese medical documents has rarely been reported. Considering the sheer size of the population in China, Chinese medical language processing technology may be an important subject in translational medicine research in China. Translational medicine research depends on a large cohort of human tissue samples. Tissue bank is the core of clinical research information platform. The efficiency of procedures about disease prediction, personalized treatment, and assessment studies will be judged on the protein or gene level using human tissue, blood and body fluids. The research results of these biological macromolecules in human tissues will directly determine their values in clinical practices and commercial prospects. The establishment of high-quality and high-level information systems is one of the foundations of translational medicine.

Una experiencia interesante en el uso de la información y de las bases de datos poblacionales

IntroductionIn order to support decisions and analyze outcomes, the Spanish Health System has shown a great interest in developing data bases and high quality information systems. Nevertheless the use of these data bases are limited, not very systematized and, some times, their accessibility may be difficult. Material and methodsWe describe in this review the experience in using the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Science (ICES, Ontario, Canada) as an efficient model to improve the usefulness of these data bases. ResultsUnder restrictive conditions of confidentiality and privacy, the ICES has the legal capacity to use several population based data bases, for research projects and reports. ICES's functional structure (with an administrative and scientific level) is an interesting framework since it guarantees its independent and economic assessment. DiscussionTo date, its scientific production has been high in many areas of knowledge and open to those interested, with points of view of many health care professionals (including management), for whom the quality of research is of the ultimate importance, to be able to access these resources.