Urinary catheters often are placed unnecessarily, used without physician awareness, and associated with a very common and expensive complication—hospital-acquired catheter-associated urinary tract infection (CAUTI). In this paper we describe our experience in developing, implementing, and analyzing a retrospective, comprehensive medical record review regarding urinary catheter use and identification of urinary tract infections as CAUTIs. We share the results of urinary catheter use measures to illustrate the complexity in identifying catheter use in medical records that are being used to generate quality measures for comparing hospitals. We also discuss our experience involving resident physicians as collaborators in an opportunity for learning about patient safety research. Additionally, we share our experience related to maintaining compliance with the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) resident duty work hour regulations.