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A Data Accounting System for Clinical Investigators

^a Office of Academic Affiliations, Department of Veterans Affairs, Washington, DC
^b Allocation Resource Center, Department of Veterans Affairs, Braintree, MA
^c Private Practice, Dallas, TX
^d University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, Dallas, TX
^e University of New Mexico School of Medicine, Albuquerque, NM
^f University of Texas at Dallas, Dallas, TX
^g Martingale Research Corporation, Plano, TX.

^_* Correspondence and reprints: T. Michael Kashner, PhD, JD, MPH, Department of Clinical Sciences, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, 5323 Harry Hines Blvd., Dallas, TX 75390-9066 (Email: michael.kashner{at}va.gov).

Received for publication: 07/19/06; accepted for publication: 04/10/07.

Clinical investigators often preprocess, process, and analyze their data without benefit of formally organized research centers to oversee data management. This article outlines a practical three-file structure to help guide these investigators track and document their data through processing and analyses. The proposed process can be implemented without additional training or specialized software. Thus, it is particularly well suited for research projects with small budgets or limited access to viable research/data coordinating centers.