Tutorial: planning for data collection. Part I: Asking the right question

While data collection is fundamental to any scientifically based effort, health care improvement teams often report that it is one of the most frustrating aspects of their work. Groups that do succeed in gathering some data can also sometimes find that the data they have worked so hard to obtain does not really help them or deepen their understanding of the process. The root of many of these problems can be traced to insufficient planning for data collection and to fundamental misunderstandings about the eventual goals of such studies. In this tutorial, we will explore a systematic way of thinking through the planning for data collection that will result in a higher probability of generating useful information.