Prototype inventory of local health data sources published

A new list of the data sources in NHS, local authority and academic organisations that could be used for research and service planning has been published by Bristol Health Partners and the Elizabeth Blackwell Institute at the University of Bristol.

Researchers and people planning health and care services can use information routinely collected by health, social care and academic organisations to improve health. However, there hasn’t been an easy way to understand what information people might be able to work with in our region, and where it’s held.

Hosted on the Bristol Open Data Platform, this prototype inventory is a first step towards describing the health and care related data in and around Bristol.

The inventory doesn’t contain personal data. It was collated from the organisations that contribute to Bristol Health Partners, selected partners in our local Sustainability and Transformation Partnership and key health informatics and research initiatives, during late 2016 and early 2017.

A report into the lessons learned from the project highlights the importance of developing a policy which would make it easier for information of this type to be collected more consistently, and shared.

Dr Julian Walker, Chair of the Local Digital Health R&D Group which oversaw the project said:

“It’s been a huge task pulling together the information on all the
datasets in our partner organisations and we are grateful to colleagues in Bristol Health Partners and in partner organisations for supporting this project. We have located over
450 datasets in total.

“The potential for linking datasets and for developing
unique collaborations between partners is now looking viable if challenging,
and we are keen to work with and support patients, service users, academics, NHS and local authority
colleagues to see that data sources described in the inventory are used to their
full potential – we are open to approaches and suggestions.”

Access the Local Health Data Source Inventory

Read the lessons learned report from the project (PDF).

Please get in touch at [email protected] if you’d like to know more.