A method, system and medium are provided for enabling re-creation of a time-ordered sequence of clinical data. Sets of data elements for a patient are received in sequence from a clinical system, and for each data element a time stamp is attached. For any given set of data elements, a maximum time stamp is determined, implying that all events in a clinical system resulting in modifications to data elements contained in the set occurred on or before the maximum time stamp. A subsequent retrieval from a clinical system yields a set of data elements in which the time stamp for each data element occurs after the maximum time stamp from the previous set.