Geoconda: An Internet Environment for the Standardisation of Data and Terminologies Christian Setzkorn, Azzam F. Taktak, Bertil Damato* Departments of Clinical Engineering and *Ophthalmology, Royal Liverpool University Hospital, UK Abstract. Diseases, such as uveal melanoma, are rare. It can therefore take a long time to accumulate enough data for a valid analysis. International collaborations can help to accelerate the accumulation of data. However, such collaborations require the standardisation of data and terminologies. The Internet is an ideal technology to facilitate this. This paper introduces the Geoconda project, which uses a website and a database to allow, among other things, this standardisation. Introduction This research was motivated by the fact that uveal melanomas have a very rare occurrence. The United Kingdom incidence of uveal melanoma is five per million year (Damato & Lecuona 2004; Scholes et al. 2003). Hence, it may take many years to accumulate enough patient data for statistical analysis. International collaborations can help to accelerate the accumulation of data. However, such collaborations require the standardisation of data and terminologies. The Internet is an ideal technology to facilitate this and yet, only a small number of researchers have made use of this valuable resource (Ohno-Machado et al. 1997). This paper introduces the Geoconda project 1 . It uses a website and a database to facilitate the standardisation and the communication of ideas. Figure 1 shows the current Geoconda homepage 2 . Fig. 1. Homepage of the Geoconda project. 1 Geoconda stands for General Ocular Oncology Database. 2 Please note that members have to login to reach this site. This ensures security and confidentiality. 16