Requirements and tasks of cohorts and registers, the German KoRegIT project.

ABSTRACT

Epidemiological cohorts and registers (KoReg) are long lasting and complex research projects, which need systematic and extensive planning and steering. The aim of the KoRegIT project was to develop a generic catalogue of requirements to support the organisational- and IT-structure of KoReg. The catalogue of requirements comprises the top level (TL) tasks of the core processes. All TL were classified into the following project phases 1. Development, 2. Operation, 3. Completion. According to the defined TL tasks, the appropriate use cases (UC) were identified. The catalogue currently specifies 45 TL tasks and 207 UC. The UC were elaborated by a short and standardized description of the task, the involved actors (human or external systems), the preconditions, which have to be fulfilled in order to realize this task, the normal flow of the task and the post conditions. The developed catalogue was reviewed by representatives of different KoReg in Germany. The draft catalogue of requirements was revised according to the reviewer's feedback and discussion. The revised and complete catalogue with all elaborated UC was reviewed again by further experts. The developed KoRegIT catalogue of requirements offers a supporting tool to set-up the organisational structures and processes of KoReg as well as the definition of the needed IT-infrastructure. In addition it can be used to optimize or to expand these structures.