Spinal Cord Injury

Data Standards

Organized by domains and subdomains often used in clinical studies, data standards include:

  • CDEs — Classified as Core, Supplemental–Highly Recommended, Supplemental, or Exploratory
  • CRF Modules — Template forms that logically organize CDEs for data collection
  • Guidance Documents — Provide further information about the CDEs.
  • Instrument Notice of Copyright (NOC) Documents — Include pertinent information on recommended instruments (Instrument Notice of Copyright Information)

SCI Start-Up Resource Listing: All Core and Supplemental–Highly Recommended CDEs recommended for SCI study start-up.

SCI Highlight Summary: Overview of all SCI-specific CDE recommendations as they appear on the website.

Click Expand All to view the CDEs associated with the CRF modules, organized by domain and subdomain.

 

Overview

The use of different measures to assess similar study variables and/or differing metrics to assess outcomes may limit important advances in Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) research. Adoption of common data elements, or CDEs, (which include variable definitions and recommended measures), can facilitate comparison of findings across studies. The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) and other Federal agencies and international organizations have the common mission of developing data standards for clinical research.

To develop the SCI CDEs, scientific experts were invited to participate in subject-specific Working Groups to develop recommendations for specific topic-driven common data elements. The resulting SCI CDE Version 1.0 recommendations were published in Spinal Cord in 2015. The CDEs and case report forms (CRFs) can be viewed on the Data Standards tab. Additional pediatric-specific recommendations were developed in 2015.

The purpose of the International SCI data sets is to standardize the collection and reporting of minimal information necessary to describe a study population that would allow meaningful comparison of study data. The American Spinal Injury Association (ASIA)International Spinal Cord Society (ISCoS) and the NINDS CDE Team collaborated to incorporate the International SCI data sets into the NINDS Spinal Cord Injury CDEs.  

The SCI CDE recommendations provide consistent variable names for the data elements and proposed structures for relational data tables. The SCI CDE recommendations will facilitate the adoption of these standardized variables by clinicians and researchers who are developing projects or databases. These recommended variables are intended for free use by researchers and clinicians, so clinical/research data can be easily shared and/or combined.

The References section includes publications that further describe and outline the development of the data sets listed below.

Roster

The Spinal Cord Injury CDE Working Group is comprised of eight different subgroups. The Working Group members have developed the CDEs for their specific subgroups. The SCI CDE Working Group is supported by the NINDS CDE Team. The subgroups began meeting by teleconference in July 2013 and held calls every four to six weeks to define the CDEs for their domains and to recommend standardized, validated instruments for SCI research.

Staff members from the NINDS CDE Team (composed of NINDS Program Directors along with their contractor) approached the Executive Committee of the International SCI Standards and Data Sets committees (ECSCI) after they became aware of the work performed by the various SCI data set working groups. The International Spinal Cord Society (ISCoS) and the American Spinal Injury Association (ASIA) have since collaborated to incorporate the International SCI data sets into the NINDS CDEs. The NINDS CDE Team has worked with members of the Executive Committee of the International SCI Standards and Data Sets committees (ECSCI) to develop the SCI CDEs. The Spinal Cord Injury CDE Oversight Committee was created in 2015.

The complete SCI CDE Working Group roster and the rosters by Subgroup are shown below.

Publications

Publications related to the development of the International Spinal Cord Injury Data Sets

Publications related to the SCI CDE effort

Publications related to the development of the International Spinal Cord Injury Data Sets

Publications related to the development of International Spinal Cord Injury

Additional references

Updates

Please see attached revision history document. Please contact NINDSCDE@emmes.com if you require further information or have any questions about the revision history.

Spinal Cord Injury CDE Revision History