Defining Custom Metrics

Accessing Custom Metrics

To access your organization's custom metrics, click on the ProKnow icon in the top left corner of the page, and select Custom Metrics under Organization Settings. Just to the right of the main navigation are vertical tabs for the other Organization Settings. The remainder of the view is devoted to the area where the custom metrics may be defined. If you do not yet have custom metrics, this space will contain a box titled, "No Custom Metrics." Otherwise, your custom metrics will be displayed in the table.

Creating Custom Metrics

1. Click the Add custom metric... link.

2. Choose a Name, the Type, and the Context for your custom metric.

   When choosing a name, use words that will be clear to the people using your system. A good custom metric name is clear while being as concise as possible.

   Choose a type that suits the data you wish to record and analyze. Numbers are best if you want to analyze your data in a histogram or scatterplot across a population of patients. Text and Choices can both be used for grouping data across collections. Choices, however, is best when the possible set of values is fixed to a limited set of values, while text is best if you would like to allow free-form text entry.

   The context specifies the level at which the custom metric data will be defined. For example, for a metric that specifies whether the contours of a structure set were generated by an auto-segmentation algorithm, you would likely wish to specify the context of Structure Set. Another way to determine the appropriate context of a custom metric is to think about the "highest" point in the hierarchy where the custom metric will have a unique value. For instance, a custom metric titled "Dose Algorithm" that indicates the type of dose algorithm used (e.g., Pencil Beam, Collapsed Cone, or Monte Carlo) would be inappropriate to store at the Plan context since multiple doses, generated by different algorithms, may exist under a single plan (i.e., the value is not unique to a plan).

3. Press the Create button to create the custom metric.

Editing Custom Metrics

1. Double-click the custom metric you wish to edit or select the row and press the Edit button located in the toolbar.
2. Modify the field values as needed.
3. If you have elected to change the type of the custom metric and upgrading the existing values is a non-trivial operation, you may be asked to specify how existing values should be handled. Please note that the option to upgrade existing values is not possible if you are also making changes to the context of the custom metric. This is because altering the context of a custom metric will result in the removal of any existing custom metric data (so there will be no data to upgrade).
   

   From	To	Trivial Upgrade
   Text	Number	No
   Text	Choices	No
   Number	Text	Yes
   Number	Choices	No
   Choices	Text	Yes
   Choices	Number	No

4. If you have elected to change the context of the custom metric you will be asked to confirm your change. Once you've read and understood the confirmation message, check the confirmation checkbox.
5. Press the Save button to save your changes.

Deleting Custom Metrics

1. Select the custom metrics you wish to delete using the checkbox for each custom metric row.
2. Press the Delete button located in the toolbar.
3. Once you've read and understood the confirmation message, check the confirmation checkbox, and press the Delete button.