A system (10) for retrieving data from a database (22) using a data management system (20) includes a change retrieval engine (50) that is coupled to the data management system (20). The change retrieval engine (50) determines that data in the database (22) managed by the data management system (20) has been changed and receives information from the data management system (20) identifying one or more categories with which the changed data is associated. The change retrieval engine (50) also accesses a data model (54) to identify data to be retrieved from the database (22) using the data management system (20) according to the received information. The data model (54) identifies data related to the categories. Furthermore, the change retrieval engine (50) requests the data identified by the data model (54) from the data management system (20) and receives the data from the data management system (20). The change retrieval engine (50) stores the data in a data log (74) and communicates a transfer command. The system also includes a change transfer engine (90) that is coupled to the change retrieval engine (50). The change transfer engine (90) receives the transfer command, obtains the data from the data log (74), and communicates the data to an external system (40).