Extracting data recorded with OpenSDE: possibilities and limitations.

Purpose: OpenSDE is an application intended to support structured data entry in a variety of settings, such as routine care and clinical research. The past years development has focused on data entry to support expressiveness and flexibility. The focus is now shifting to data extraction: what are the possibilities for extracting the data and does the adopted strategy pose limitations?

Methods: Data extraction is supported by presenting the concepts for extraction in the same tree structure as for data entry. Users can select all or a sub selection of these concepts for extraction. Selected concepts are extracted and converted to a table format that can be queried using conventional tools.

Results: The extraction tool (entity export) provides a successful technical solution for data extraction. Using the extracted data, however, leads to obstacles that are a result of a fundamental design principle of OpenSDE.