There was a study centre coordinator at each site (CLR and LMB) that was responsible for protocol design and daily management of questionnaire and physical testing teams.
SM: Contributed to the planning of the international field work and particularly data management, development of questionnaires and revisions of the manuscript.
Finally, we would like to thank Sjef van de Velde for his support in gathering the electronic database information and Janine Liefers for her support in the electronic data management of the questionnaires.
The pre-publication history for this paper can be accessed here: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6963/13/363/prepub We thank Kitty van der Meer, research assistant, for her work in the distribution and management of the questionnaires and data.
Since the doctors in charge of this survey did not intervene with the patients' medical management, the objectivity of questionnaires completed by patients themselves was ensured.
Also we would like to thank the Dutch Practices Accreditation Organisation for the storage and management of the SCOPE questionnaire.
The software allows the self-management of questions, questionnaire design, and data management by the Clinical Department.
The quality assurance and management of data collected via questionnaires involved immediate review by field staff after completing interviews to ensure accuracy and completeness, same day review by the field supervisor, and weekly transfer of data to the data management team in Dharwad, Karnataka where data were entered and processed monthly to verify consistency and accuracy.
Anne Langston, the Chief Investigator, and a data manager based at the Queen's Medical Research Institute, Edinburgh, will coordinate the administration of questionnaires and data management.
Distribution, registration, scanning of questionnaires, and basic management of data was administered by Statistics Sweden.
Descriptive analyses will be performed regarding the data on characteristics of case management (questionnaires from the case manager).
