Department of Medicine, Division of Pulmonary, Allergy and Critical Care, Emory University School of Medicine, 49 Jesse Hill Jr Drive SE, Atlanta, GA 30303, USA. greg.martin@emory.edu
Medical databases serve a critical function in healthcare, including the areas of patient care, administration, research and education. The quality and breadth of information collected into existing databases varies tremendously, between databases, between institutions and between national boundaries. The field of critical care medicine could be advanced substantially by the development of comprehensive and accurate databases.