Collaboration by Use of the Internet Yields Data of High Quality and Detects Non-uniform Management of Patients with Helicobacter pylori Infection

Background: The benefits of new technology steadily being introduced in medicine should be documented. In this study, remote entry of a set of data from the daily routine was submitted via the Internet to a common database. The usefulness and quality of the information are evaluated. Methods: Fourteen hospitals reported a common data set on consecutive Hp+ve patients handled in accordance with daily practice. Participants submitted their data via the Internet to a database. There was no monitoring or other surveillance. No audit was planned or expected, but was nevertheless possible. Doctor compliance with the common agreement was checked, differences in medical practice were noted and quality was assessed comparing the most important source data with the data in the final database. Results: Four-hundred-and-forty patients were included. The quality of the reported data was high, only 1.3% showing a discrepancy between source data and the database. Overall treatment success was 89%, with no significant differences between hospitals. There were significant differences in clinical practice between the centres, the proportion of patients treated for ulcer disease varying from 36% to 96% ( P < 0.001). Doctor compliance with the agreed collaboration varied significantly ( P < 0.001). Conclusion: Internet collaboration through remote data entry in a common database yields data of high quality without monitoring, and is a powerful and resource economic tool for clinical multicentre trials and quality assurance.