A web-based SNOMED CT browser: distributed and real-time use of SNOMED CT during the clinical research process

To facilitate the use of standard terminologies in clinical research data collection, members of the Rare Disease Clinical Research Network have developed tools to support study investigators and research staff to code clinical research data using SNOMED CT at the point of research. This tool is customized to help the user find appropriate SNOMED CT concepts quickly, and has implications for the successful implementation of data standards to facilitate high quality research data. This paper gives an overview of an automated tool for accessing, searching, and navigating SNOMED CT real-time, at distributed and remote clinical study locations. Also, the features of the tool that enable complete data are presented, as well as possible metrics for evaluation in terms of compliance, consistency, and reliability of coding.