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REDCap Background Information

REDCap was developed by an informatics core at Vanderbilt University with ongoing support from NCRR and NIH grants in 2004. REDCap was designed to address common problems for academic biomedical researchers hoping to use electronic databases. First, major vendor EDC and CDMS solutions are targeted and priced for large clinical trials, and can be prohibitively expensive for investigator-initiated studies or other such studies at a smaller scale. Secondly, the independent research environment often lacks the informatics and other multidisciplinary support necessary for effective IT integration into research protocols. The REDCap software as distributed through the REDCap consortium attempts to facilitate informatics support for clinical researchers and foster a collaborative network of institutional researchers who share and support REDCap as a common research tool.

REDCap has a broad user base in the global academic community and is still actively supported by Vanderbilt University. More information is available at the Vanderbilt REDCap site.

LA CaTS has been hosting our own version of REDCap since July 1, 2013.
Features available at no cost on the LA CaTS installation of REDCap:

  • Hosted in a secure server room at Pennington Biomedical Research Center, maintained with regular backups and security updates
  • Web-based (securely connect over the Internet) with several levels of permissions for users
  • Multiple studies and case report forms
  • Longitudinal Study capability
  • Survey capability (including automated invitations)
  • Automatic validation of data points
  • Export to multiple formats (SPSS, SAS, Stata, R, Excel/CSV)
  • Audit trails for tracking data manipulation and export
  • Online staff training resources
  • LA CaTS staff available to answer questions via email
  • Active user community

Additional Reading:

Paul A. Harris et al. (2009). Research electronic data capture (REDCap) - A metadata-driven methodology and workflow process for providing translational research informatics support. Journal of Biomedical Informatics.

 42 (2): 377-381. doi:10.1016/j.jbi.2008.08.010