Introduction: The New Zealand National Poisons Centre has developed an extensive clinical poisons information database, TOXINZ. This resource was originally provided on a CD-Rom, and in 2002 made accessible solely via the Internet (www.toxinz.com). It was unknown whether users would prefer the CD-Rom or Internet version to access the same information.
Methods: In September 2003 a total of 100 questionnaires were mailed to the emergency departments of 15 hospitals to be answered by medical and nursing staff utilizing the Internet version of TOXINZ. The results were then compared with a nearly identical questionnaire conducted in the same way in the same hospitals when only the CD-Rom database version was available.
Results: There was a 79% response rate with both medical and nursing staff rating the poisons management recommendations highly when accessed both on CD-Rom and Internet. Statistically significant differences (p<0.05, Mann-Whitney U-test) identified the Internet accessed database as: supplying better visual aids, being more repetitive, harder to search, and more difficult to print.
Conclusion: Those developing Internet accessible databases for a healthcare environment are encouraged to incorporate robust search functionality, mobility solutions, and an ability to integrate with other healthcare applications.