The Ligurian HIV network: How medical informatics standards can help clinical research

Integrating evidence from systematic research in daily clinical practice is one of the pillars of evidence-based medicine. Electronic data capture tools simplify data collection from different centers and supports the management of multicenter clinical trials. The Ligurian HIV Network (LHN) is one such tool, originating from a regional effort to integrate clinical trial capabilities for HIV and other chronic infectious diseases. In order to manually collect a complete report of all clinical tests on patients enrolled in a trial, a strenuous human effort and the allocation of great resources would be necessary. Moreover, the risk of error in a manual system is very high. The proposed system automatically extracts clinical data from the EHR of three hospitals of the LHN in a standardized way, and enhance their re-use in clinical trials. Through dedicated questionnaires, physicians reported a strongly positive feedback about the efficacy of the platform in supporting clinical research.