Medical students, residents and fellows often under take formal research projects during their training. A basic familiarity with the conduct and appraisal of research is an important competency for all medical professionals. Therefore, the availability of guidance and education on many aspects of conducting or appraising research is increasingly available through medical literature, textbooks, and coursework.However, a core skill which is rarely contained within these resources is the ability to design and create an effective electronic database or spreadsheet. This is ironic be cause data collection and entry is often the most time-intensive part of a research project. It may be assumed that such a skill is either inherently present or can be quickly acquired on the job through referencing appropriate software manuals.Such manuals, however, are not often specifically geared to the needs of the medical trainee creating and using a clinical research database.

Successful projects:

"MM Genetics Research Project"

"PCI Multi Center Database"

"Primary Angioplasty Research Project"

"Serum uric acid and clinical outcome of Paroxysmal Atrial Fibrillation"

"ROPAC Study"

"Gender-based differences in clinical presentation and outcome of primary PCI"