Nursing service data for research in patient care.

Nursing service records from the nontechnical medical care program, an Oklahoma statewide Medicaid long-term community care program, provided a unique data base to gather information for research purposes and program improvement. This article describes the process of developing a data collection (coding) form to extract a minimum data set and a method of training lay coders to use the form. Inherent problems associated with this process from the beginning to the end are also shared.