Hi Joanna

I always keep a 'track changes' version as part of the audit trail, but more so that it's easy to see what changes have been made than to necessarily indicate exactly who suggested changing what. I tend to take the view that once a new protocol is agreed, everyone signs up to it and so it's largely irrelevant who proposed what at the discussion stage - but it's very important to be able to look back and see what text was changed without having to sit and cross check the two finalised 'changes accepted' version.

I also only ever keep a single copy between versions - the original approved version, the new one in tracked changes, and the new one with changes accepted. I don't see the point of keeping every step along the way when Bill, Bob and Ben added their thoughts - just the version initially submitted and the changes from there that are formally amended. Otherwise you end up with so much paperwork it actually makes the whole picture less clear and it's impossible to see within the files what the important steps were.

Hope that makes sense.
CTU