Some jurisdictions have now mandated the use of E-codes in hospital records. This is an attempt to improve the accuracy of the medical record in identifying injuries, and many injury researchers have spend a great deal of time on improving the use of E-codes in medical records. Many still are doing so today.

But this raises an interesting debate. As most injury monitoring systems are based upon medical records, the presence of an E-code is very important to identifying and defining injury events. However, for injury research, are we better off trying to improve E-coding, or would it be more worthwhile to use other methods for injury monitoring.