Database Integration Question

Hello all.

I am currently working on a project for several Hospitals. The application is written in Java, and the database is either Oracle or MySql, depending on the client. For a while now, we have been asked to integrate our appliations database with the databases of the other Hospital applicatoins, such as payroll, scheduling and so on. I have been looking around online to see how others have done this, and I have come up with two standards, the HL7 standard and DICOM standard.

Now, lets look at this on a slightly higher level than this. Even conforming to these standards, we would still need to establish some sort of communication between ourselves and whichever application we wish to integrate our database with, correct? How does database integration work in the real world? Standards are great, and I am sure that they help a great deal when it comes down to it, but the fact is that there are hundreds of applications we need to integrate with across various clients and it seems like it would take a lifetime to do one at a time. So, is there an easier way? Are there any good vendors that do this? I have found some vendors, but picking one can be detremental to my career if they are no good. How have others tackled this problem?

Thanks in advance
Dan Received on Mon Sep 29 2003 - 10:30:18 CDT