Barriers to the Reuse of Routinely Recorded Clinical Data: A Field Report

Today, clinical data is routinely recorded in vast amounts, but its reuse can be challenging. A secondary use that should ideally be based on previously collected clinical data is the computation of clinical quality indicators. In the present study, we attempted to retrieve all data from our hospital that is required to compute a set of quality indicators in the domain of colorectal cancer surgery. We categorised the barriers that we encountered in the scope of this project according to an existing framework, and provide recommendations on how to prevent or surmount these barriers. Assuming that our case is not unique, these recommendations might be applicable for the design, evaluation and optimisation of Electronic Health Records.