Two nonprofits—the Critical Path Institute (C-Path), based in Tucson, and the Clinical Data Interchange Standards Consortium (C-DISC) of Round Rock, Texas—are teaming up to set common standards for companies to report clinical data on diseases considered major public health challenges. The aim is to quicken R&D efforts and potentially facilitate the evaluation of new therapies at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). “Most companies are recognizing greater efficiency when we all call an apple an apple,” says Raymond Woosley, C-Path's president and CEO. The data standards are intended as useful guidelines rather than mandates. C-Path and C-DISC built a database for Alzheimer's disease, launched in June 2010, as part of C-Path's Coalition Against Major Diseases project, and data from 4,000 patients have now been mapped to the standard. The joint effort will now be expanded to include data on amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Huntington's disease, multiple sclerosis, lung cancer and diabetes. Standardized data would allow regulators to compare clinical data results across trials and across companies. ShaAvhree Buckman, Director of the Office of Translational Sciences at the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER) welcomes these data standards, as they capitalize on work already set in motion by existing groups.