The SOCA Coordinating Center is located at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, and is responsible for coordination, statistical planning and accumulation of quality data from the clinical centers, training of the clinical center personnel in data collection, data management and transmission, and the management of technical aspects of CC activities.

The CC participates in and coordinates the development of the study protocol, and the study handbook.  CC investigators design, produce, and test data collection forms to be used in the study, and develop, test, and implement the data entry system.

Quality and quantity of data from the clinical centers are monitored and reported by the CC to the clinical centers and to the Steering Committee.  The CC prepares confidential reports for the Policy and Data Monitoring Board (PDMB), as well as interim and final analyses and other specific statistical analyses and reports.   The CC supports manuscript preparation through data analysis, statistical consultation, and editorial tasks.

The director of the CC is a voting member of the Steering Committee; other epidemiologists and statisticians participate as investigators in the study and are assisted by research assistants, programmers, and data clerks.

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