An innovator in health informatics, Lawrence L. Weed, MD, died June 3 at the age of 93.
Dr. Weed developed standards of data organization in medical records, or SOAP notes, a method that later became known as the problem-oriented medical record. As an advocate for medical record standards, Dr. Weed received government grants throughout the 1960s to develop computerized health records based on the POMR.
As director of the PROMIS Laboratory at the University of Vermont College of Medicine in Burlington, Vt., he pioneered problem-knowledge couplers — tools he intended both clinicians and patients use with POMR in an electronic form.
"The ultimate impact of Dr. Weed's concepts remains to be seen. Fragments of Dr. Weed's work are in widespread use, but his larger body of work is not yet well understood," reads Dr. Weed's obituary.
From the 1960s until last year, Dr. Weed spoke and published about the standards and tools for clinical information and reforms in medical practice.
Dr. Weed died in his home in Underhill, Vt.
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