Data Systems

Although stocks pulled back near the close yesterday, the Dow Jones industrial average managed to finish with a slim gain. The blue-chip indicator edged up 4.47 points to close at 3,647.90. Many health care and furniture issues registered substantial advances.WALL STREET WISDOM: "Slow and steady wins the race." (Aesop) . . . "I always know it's time to get out of the market when my barber gives me tips to buy." (Anonymous Baltimorean) . . . "Gentlemen prefer bonds." (Andrew Mellon, 1926.)

Maryland Chief Judge Robert M. Bell promised lawmakers yesterday that the state's court system would move quickly to fix its procurement and computer security systems after auditors uncovered serious lapses in both areas. Bell told the General Assembly's Joint Committee on Audits that the judiciary, criticized by auditors for cost overruns and no-bid contracting, will adopt a comprehensive procurement policy by the end of the year. In one case, auditors said, the judiciary has allowed the price of a land-records system to swell from an initial estimate of $18 million to $51 million.

WASHINGTON -- Fresh out of the Marine Corps in the late 1960s, Ron Benigo nabbed a job with H. Ross Perot's crackerjack computer business in Dallas and was awed by the pint-sized boss with the oversized ideas."

Bell Atlantic Mobile Systems and Westinghouse Electronic Systems plan to launch the nation's first wireless data system in Baltimore early next year, giving users of laptops and other portable devices a way to easily send and receive information on the road.The landmark system -- a first for Bell Atlantic and the industry -- represents the initial large-scale entry by a cellular carrier into the data transmission market.The network is expected to provide business customers with two-way wireless data transmission throughout metropolitan Baltimore.

Continuing to explore ways to market its medical expertise, Johns Hopkins Medicine announced two health-by-telecommunications deals yesterday.Hopkins will join three other prestigious medical centers -- Massachusetts General Hospital, the Cleveland Clinic and Duke University Medical Center -- in providing telemedicine consulting for a company called WorldCare Limited.And InteliHealth, for which Hopkins provides health information, announced that its World Wide Web health site will be an "anchor tenant" for the Health Channel of the on-line service America Online.

WASHINGTON -- Lapses in using a digital medical record system for tracking wounded soldiers have led to medical mistakes and delays in care, and have kept thousands of injured troops from receiving benefits, according to former defense and military medical officials. The Defense Department's inability to get all hospitals to use the system has routinely forced thousands of wounded soldiers to endure long waits for treatment, the officials said, and exposed others to needless testing. The problem might have played a role in the suicide of a soldier last year after he was taken from Iraq to Fort Lewis in Washington state.

After a series of delays of key student reports caused by the glitch-prone Student Management System, or SMS, Howard County schools officials now face worries that the program might be discontinued. Chancery Software Ltd., the British Columbia-based SMS provider, was acquired in May by Pearson Education, a New Jersey-based student data programming company. Although officials say that Pearson Education is one of the top companies of its kind, the acquisition has left some uncertainty over the future of SMS. "We are in constant communication with [Pearson Education]

Columbia-based MedStar Health, a seven-hospital system, announced yesterday that Microsoft is buying its system to organize patient data from a variety of sources and make it available to doctors and nurses in a fraction of a second. For MedStar, it means a chance to see a system created by two of its emergency room doctors at Washington Hospital Center, then expanded over the past decade, get developed more fully by the world's biggest software company, with its vast capabilities and marketing prowess.