A common and clonable environment to support research using patient data.

The volume and complexity of information systems for data oriented clinical research at Mayo Clinic began to exceed available database-analyst resources. A decision was made to generate a clonable, generic system for health services research; this was implemented for a medium-sized prototype project. Since 1988, it has been reconfigured to support several score data projects at less than one-tenth the cost for database analysts. Further, user involvement and empowerment has increased their satisfaction and inquiry abilities with their specific systems.