On the other hand, routinely collected administrative data can suffer from problems with completeness and accuracy data collection, issues which are not under the direct control of researchers and which can be difficult to quantify [ 71].
To preserve the weekly periodicity without being affected by data collection issues, we analyze the data from December 5 to December 11, and from January 30 to March 11 (49 days in total).
Ongoing data collection issues were addressed through monthly conference calls.
We discuss the specific data collection issues for step 4 and 5 below.
Investigators and research nurses meet regularly to discuss data collection issues and study progress.
Data collection issues and procedure standardization were managed at regular team meetings among research staff and investigators from both provinces.
Neither microalbuminuria nor proteinuria was withheld in the analysis because of data collection issues (too few collections; no control on validity of measurement).
Regular meetings between research personnel to discuss data collection issues and study progress should also help to ensure very good standardisation of the data collection procedures across study sites.
Thus early identification of data collection issues, and immediate establishment of monitoring, enhanced the quality of the dataset throughout the trial, and kept the proportion of missing data to a minimum.
Quality control procedures contained within the study will provide a means of adjusting analysis for information bias and also enable identification of the key data collection issues that require improvement to maximise the usefulness of this surveillance approach.
While no formal continuing training program during the study was implemented, additional training was provided as needed if cognitive data collection issues were noted by centrally trained study monitors.
