title: Utility of electronic medical record for recruitment in clinical research: from rare to common disease.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Recruitment for clinical trials is a major challenge. Movement disorders, which do not have associated diagnostic laboratory tests, may be especially prone to inaccuracy in coding. Our objective was to evaluate the accuracy of diagnostic codes such as cervical dystonia (CD) and PD in an electronic medical record.
  
  
  METHODS
  Retrospective chart review was performed to confirm the ICD-9 diagnoses of PD, CD and diabetes mellitus type 2 (DM-2), using published clinical diagnostic criteria (PD, CD) and hemoglobin A1c ≥ 6.5 (DM-2).
  
  
  RESULTS
  421 charts (n=129, n=142, n=150 for PD, CD and DM-2, respectively) were reviewed. The accuracy rate was different between all diseases examined with an overall p<0.001. In post hoc pairwise comparisons, the accuracy of DM-2 diagnosis by ICD-9 (96.6%) was greater than CD (88.0%) and both greater than PD (55.0%) (p≤0.003).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Using an electronic medical record based screening of clinically diagnosed diseases such as CD may be more accurate than previously thought and may identify potential clinical trial participants even without confirmatory lab tests available.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA.
authors.forename: Tapan
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Thacker
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA.
authors.forename: Ashley R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Wegele
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA.
authors.forename: Sarah
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Pirio Richardson
keywords: Parkinson disease; clinical research; dystonia