NHS Needs Single Point of Access for Data

A report has found that clinicians struggle with access to basic data and recommends a single online point of access for healthcare datasets

The Open data in the health sector report, which was commissioned by NHS England in 2016, has found that healthcare data is often fragmented and duplicated. The report by Giuseppe Sollazzo in collaboration with Open Health Care UK, which looked at “the needs and experiences of people using open data about health”, said the healthcare sector should establish a single point of access to datasets to get rid of the duplication and varying standards.

Through interviews with a range of healthcare professionals, researchers, academics and government officials, the report found that the most “pressing issue” is the “fragmentation of data publishing locations and variation in standards across the health system”. “The baffling array of data sources, combined with the complex structure of the NHS, creates confusion and extra work for almost anyone doing research, analysis, or building products and services using NHS data,” the report said.

One of the report authors, David Miller from Open Health Care UK, said in a blog post that one of the key problems emerging from the research was “the lack of data routinely used as part of clinical practice in the NHS”. Gavin Jamie, a GP who was interviewed by the authors, said clinicians in general practice struggle to get access to data on hospital admissions...