to facilitate a clear understanding of the present invention , illustrative examples are provided herein which describe certain aspects of the invention . however , it is to be appreciated that these illustrations are not meant to limit the scope of the invention , and are provided herein to illustrate certain concepts associated with the invention . it is also to be understood that the present invention may be implemented in various forms of hardware , software , firmware , special purpose processors , or a combination thereof . preferably , the present invention is implemented in software as a program tangibly embodied on a program storage device . the program may be uploaded to , and executed by , a machine comprising any suitable architecture . preferably , the machine is implemented on a computer platform having hardware such as one or more central processing units ( cpu ), a random access memory ( ram ), and input / output ( i / o ) interface ( s ). the computer platform also includes an operating system and microinstruction code . the various processes and functions described herein may either be part of the microinstruction code or part of the program ( or combination thereof ) which is executed via the operating system . in addition , various other peripheral devices may be connected to the computer platform such as an additional data storage device and a printing device . it is to be understood that , because some of the constituent system components and method steps depicted in the accompanying figures are preferably implemented in software , the actual connections between the system components ( or the process steps ) may differ depending upon the manner in which the present invention is programmed . [ 0027 ] fig1 is a block diagram of a computer processing system 100 to which the present invention may be applied according to an embodiment of the present invention . the system 100 includes at least one processor ( hereinafter processor ) 102 operatively coupled to other components via a system bus 104 . a read - only memory ( rom ) 106 , a random access memory ( ram ) 108 , an i / o interface 110 , a network interface 112 , and external storage 114 are operatively coupled to the system bus 104 . various peripheral devices such as , for example , a display device , a disk storage device ( e . g ., a magnetic or optical disk storage device ), a keyboard , and a mouse , may be operatively coupled to the system bus 104 by the i / o interface 110 or the network interface 112 . the computer system 100 may be a standalone system or be linked to a network via the network interface 112 . the network interface 112 may be a hard - wired interface . however , in various exemplary embodiments , the network interface 112 can include any device suitable to transmit information to and from another device , such as a universal asynchronous receiver / transmitter ( uart ), a parallel digital interface , a software interface or any combination of known or later developed software and hardware . the network interface may be linked to various types of networks , including a local area network ( lan ), a wide area network ( wan ), an intranet , a virtual private network ( vpn ), and the internet . the external storage 114 may be implemented using a database management system ( dbms ) managed by the processor 102 and residing on a memory such as a hard disk . however , it should be appreciated that the external storage 114 may be implemented on one or more additional computer systems . for example , the external storage 114 may include a data warehouse system residing on a separate computer system . those skilled in the art will appreciate that other alternative computing environments may be used without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention . referring to fig2 a clinical trials brokerage 250 is illustrated . the clinical trials brokerage 250 is shown operatively connected to a data repository which contains patient information typically collected from one or more health care organization , such as hospitals . this data repository is called a structured clinical patient record ( cpr ) 280 . in various embodiments of the present invention , a plurality of drug companies , such as drug company 210 , request lists of persons meeting specified criteria for clinical trials . the structured cpr 280 is then consulted to obtain the lists of persons meeting the specified criteria . the specified criteria may include probability information , thus allowing the selection of patients likely to meet the specified criteria for the clinical study ( e . g ., 90 % likelihood of diabetes , 70 % likelihood of hypertension ). in this case , the relevant patient records would include probabilistic information . furthermore , persons may still be selected even though not all information needed to determine whether a patient qualifies in all respects for a clinical trial is present . in this case , the list would include “ persons of interest ” some of whom might later be excluded from participating in the clinical trial for various reasons . information about each person meeting the selection may additionally be provided , including information about other clinical trials that the person participated in and whether a placebo was administered . the system may keep track of a plurality of clinical trials , and maintain a list of person who were administered a placebo instead of the drug being tested . in many cases , a person is disqualified from a trial if he or she participated in a trial for a similar drug ; however , if it is determined that a placebo was administered , the system may be configured to not exclude the person . in other cases , the system would provide information about the trial ( s ) that the person participated in . a physician , such as physician 230 , may be contacted if one of their patients meets the specified criteria for a clinical trial . prior to releasing information to a drug company , it is generally necessary to obtain agreement of the patient &# 39 ; s physician and an informed consent of the patient to participate in the trial . for example , the physician 230 may recommend to a patient that a clinical trial being conducted by the drug company 210 would be beneficial . the details of the trial may have been forwarded to the physician 230 . furthermore , physicians may be notified of their institutional review board ( irb ) statuses ( e . g ., ‘ approved ’, ‘ pending ’, or ‘ not approved ’. expiration dates of their status may be forwarded to approved physicians . the clinical trials brokerage 250 can be notified that the patient provided an intent to participate . when the necessary informed consent information is obtained , the clinical trials brokerage 250 can provide the identity of the patient ( and other patient information ) to the drug company 210 . preferably , the structured cpr 280 is populated with patient information using data mining techniques described in “ patient data mining ,” by rao et al ., attorney docket no . 2001p20906us01 , copending u . s . patent application ser . no . 10 / ___ , ___ , filed herewith , which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety . that disclosure teaches a data mining framework for mining high - quality structured clinical information . the data mining framework includes a data miner that mines medical information from a computerized patient record based on domain - specific knowledge contained in a knowledge base . the data miner includes components for extracting information from the computerized patient record , combining all available evidence in a principled fashion over time , and drawing inferences from this combination process . the mined medical information is stored in a structured computerized patient record . to determine the specified criteria for the clinical study , multiple data sources typically need to be consulted . for example , to determine whether the patient is diabetic , the system might have to examine the following information : ( b ) drugs administered to the patient that are associated with the treatment of diabetes ( e . g ., insulin ); ( c ) patient &# 39 ; s lab values that are diagnostic of diabetes ( e . g ., two successive blood sugar readings over 250 mg / d ); ( d ) doctor mentions that the patient is a diabetic in the h & amp ; p ( history & amp ; physical ) or discharge note ( free text ); and ( e ) patient procedures ( e . g ., foot exam ) associated with being a diabetic . as can be seen , there are multiple independent sources of information , observations from which can support ( with varying degrees of certainty ) that the patient is diabetic ( or more generally has some disease / condition ). not all of them may be present , and in fact , in some cases , they may contradict each other . probabilistic observations can be derived , with varying degrees of confidence . then these observations ( e . g ., about the billing codes , the drugs , the lab tests , etc .) may be probabilistically combined to come up with a final probability of diabetes . note that there may be information in the patient record that contradicts diabetes . for instance , the patient is has some stressful episode ( e . g ., an operation ) and his blood sugar does not go up . it should be appreciated that the selection of patients for clinical trials may be based on probabilistic information . thus , a list of patients that meet the specified criteria may comprise a list of patients likely ( e . g ., according to a particular degree of confidence ) to have met the criteria for the clinical trial . since it may be necessary to obtain additional information or to verify information about a participant , the clinical trials brokerage 250 may output , or otherwise provide , questionnaires . these questionnaires may be used to ascertain qualifications for the clinical trial . for example , the patient may be asked to provide a detailed family history of particular diseases . in addition to providing a list of persons meeting the specified criteria , the clinical trials brokerage 250 may also calculate various charges and fees . for example , participating physicians may need to be compensated . the drug company may be charged a fee for the list . additionally , participants in the clinical trial may also be compensated . in various embodiments of the present invention , lists of persons who are pre - qualified for certain types of clinical trials may be generated . these lists of pre - qualified individuals may be made available to drug companies or other entities interested in conducting a clinical trial . referring to fig3 an alternate embodiment of the present invention is illustrated . in this embodiment , a clinical trials brokerage 350 is able to access a structured cpr 380 containing mined structured patient information , and also a clinical trials database 390 containing information about various clinical trials . the information in the clinical trials database 390 may include information regarding the qualifications for clinical trials along with other information regarding the trials . a patient , such as patient 335 , may request information about a particular clinical trial . the patient may either directly access the clinical trials brokerage 350 or go through a physician , such as physician 330 . the clinical trials brokerage 330 may access the structured cpr 380 ( populated with information in the same manner as the cpr 280 ) to retrieve information about the patient , and attempt to match clinical trials of interest to the patient based on the medical history of the patient and available trials . referring to fig4 a flow diagram outlining an exemplary technique for selecting a person for a clinical trial is illustrated . beginning at step 401 , a person is selected from among a set of persons meeting specified criteria . this step may include receiving a request for a list of persons meeting specified criteria for a clinical trial , and retrieving a set of patient records from a data source to determine persons meeting the specified criteria . for example , a drug company might be interested in selecting black males who are diabetic and have had a heart attack within the last three years . this might be used to test a new drug . using conventional approaches , satisfying the above - mentioned selection criteria could be difficult because computerized hospital databases generally do not store such information . however , by employing the data mining techniques described in “ patient data mining ,” by rao et al ., attorney docket no . 2001p20906us01 , copending u . s . patent application ser . no . 10 / ___ , ___ , filed herewith , a structured cpr can be populated with such patient information , thus allowing this selection criteria to be satisfied . in step 402 , the person &# 39 ; s physician can be notified that the person has been selected for the clinical trial . at this point , a hospital &# 39 ; s institutional review board ( irb ) can also be notified . the physician can also be notified if irb approval has already been granted for this trial at this site , or if he needs to wait for the irb approval for this trial . next , in step 403 , a determination is made as to whether the physician will participate in the study . if it is determined that the physician will participate , control continues to step 404 ; otherwise control terminates at step 408 . in step 404 , the person is notified that he or she may qualify for the clinical trial . the patient can be directly contacted , or , indirectly contacted through a physician . at this point , the patient may be given detailed information about the clinical trial . the patient may be asked for additional information , such as through a questionnaire . the questionnaire may be used to determine qualification for the study and / or as a way to obtain additional useful information . next , in step 405 , a determination is made as to whether the person indicated a desire to participate in the clinical trial . if the person notified his or her physician of an intent to participate , control continues to step 406 ; otherwise control terminates at step 408 . in step 406 , release information is obtained . at this point the person may be provided with a consent form or be directed to complete one provided to him by his or her physician . any information regarding participant compensation , including reimbursements , may also be provided . control continues to step 407 . in step 407 , fees and charges may be determined . for instance , the entity requesting the list of patients may be charged an appropriate fee for the list of patients . furthermore , the physician and trial participants may also be compensated for their participation in the study . control continues to step 408 where the operation stops . as shown in fig1 - 4 , this invention is preferably implemented using a general purpose computer system . however the systems and methods of this invention can be implemented using any combination of one or more programmed general purpose computers , programmed microprocessors or micro - controllers and peripheral integrated circuit elements , asic or other integrated circuits , digital signal processors , hardwired electronic or logic circuits such as discrete element circuits , programmable logic devices such as a pld , pla , fpga or pal , or the like . in general , any device capable of implementing a finite state machine that is in turn capable of implementing the flowchart shown in fig4 can be used to implement this system . although illustrative embodiments of the present invention have been described herein with reference to the accompanying drawings , it is to be understood that the invention is not limited to those precise embodiments , and that various other changes and modifications may be affected therein by one skilled in the art without departing from the scope or spirit of the invention .