A review of the progress and validation of the data collection process, the grouper and the classification systems was conducted a year later and a report published in September 1998 confirmed that the system was working well and that the data were valid.2 There are over five million ambulatory service records in the ACCS database where an ambulatory service is defined as any contact with a region [...] Expanding the Scope and Uses of ACCS Alberta Health and Wellness, as the steward of ACCS, has managed the development and the maintenance of the grouper and the data set. [...] This can be achieved through the following: 1. Extending the scope of ACCS: Using ACCS for all ambulatory reporting in the province will increase the comprehensiveness of the database and allow for more comparisons between regions and patient utilization levels. [...] A review of the progress and validation of the data collection process was conducted one year later and a report published in September 1998 confirmed that the system was working well and that the data were valid.3 Since implementation of ACCS, many changes have occurred, and the volume of data submitted to Alberta Health and Wellness has grown each year. [...] This identifies changes or differences in the “intensity” of use and allows for the differentiation of the impact of variations in volumes between age and gender categories.