The goal is to do everything possible to facilitate the captain-patient relationship so that the patient receives the best care possible. As the MTRC consults on medical problems at sea, a data base is generated relative to specific medical problems, preferred treatment modalities, medical facilities available in various ports around the world, availability and safety of evacuation services, and epidemiologic and occupational medicine data. This cumulative body of information can be relayed to all companies on an industry-wide basis. The data can be used to generate recommendations for the contents of a ship's medicine chest (including those supplies that are necessary and those that are not necessary). A secondary benefit of this system is that the medical staff in the MTRC knows in advance the ship's medicine chest inventory. Thus, valuable time is not lost asking the captain to check on the availability of a medication or supply. An MTRC is ideally situated to discern occupational patterns of disease that might be related to a certain port of call or a certain rating aboard ship. This information can be shared with company officials and seafarers who otherwise might not have ready access to it. The availability of a central storage site for medical records is important because of the high degree of mobility of the patient population. The medical record should be easily accessible to medical professionals, with the consent of the patient. An MTRC is a logical respository for medical records because around-the-clock availability of the medical record is particularly important for the medical staff when advising treatment for the patient at sea.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)