Geriatric research studies benefit from the use of proven and validated measurement instruments. Any barrier to the ready access to complete information about such instruments, including expert and scholarly commentary, is a barrier to Geriatric research. This is especially true for research focusing on multifactorial geriatric health conditions, which must necessarily draw on a wide range of measurement instruments from multiple disciplines. We propose to create a Web-based repository or data library of information about measurement instruments used in studies of multi-factorial geriatric health conditions (the Geriatrics Research Instrument Library - GRIL). This library will include scholarly reviews and analyses to provide comprehensive, expert guidance on comparing and selecting appropriate data collection instruments generated from the Systematic Assessment of Geriatric Evaluations (SAGE) project. We will design software tools for browsing, searching, and selecting instruments in GRIL based upon keyword, vocabulary and thematic input criteria. Researchers will access GRIL and select measurement instruments with the help of expert guidance for printing and/or inclusion in an automatically generated standalone microcomputer database application. This database application will be downloadable for data collection and data management by investigators in the field of geriatrics who are not necessarily affiliated with our group.
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