The development of an international, common, prospective, cardiology database. Report of the joint G8 Cardio-Associazione Nazionale Medici Cardiologi Ospedalieri (ANMCO)--Societé Française de Cardiologie (SFC) database committee.
BACKGROUND
Sharing and comparing health data at the international level is made difficult by heterogeneity in real world databases.


OBJECTIVE
Our primary objective was to field-test the implementation of the first common database developed conjointly by different national cardiological societies.


METHODS
Based upon G8-Cardio feasibility projects, the Italian Society of Hospital Cardiologists and the French Society of Cardiology joined together to standardize a cardiological, patient-oriented database, created by means of consensus agreement for sharing data in a common server. Quantification of standardization was obtained by analysing each dataset according to the possibility of merging corresponding fields. Data merging from national centres was completed in the common server and after proper data integration in the common database; a comparison was performed between French and Italian populations.


RESULTS
Standardization of contents allowed for 89% overall interoperability (merged fields) to be achieved with only 11% divergent fields. All (100%) merged homogeneous data on the first 2717 patients from peripheral centres were selected consecutively from the common database and analysed successfully. Relevant differences between the two populations were outlined.


CONCLUSIONS
The international standardization and sharing/merging of databases is feasible. This model opens the way to important applications in internationally shared health care policies.
Pristipino
Christian
C
San Filippo Neri Hospital, Rome, Italy. pristipino.c@libero.it
Danchin
Nicholas
N
Lablanche
Jean Marc
JM
Komajda
Michel
M
Tubaro
Marco
M
Maseri
Attilio
A
Cianflone
Domenico
D
D002309:Cardiology; D003628:Database Management Systems / Q000458:organization & administration*; D005060:Europe; D006331:Heart Diseases / Q000145:classification / Q000517:prevention & control*; D006801:Humans; D007391:International Cooperation; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012955:Societies, Medical; D014481:United States