Category Archives: data

Data promised at ‘consultant level’ by summer

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More from the latest briefing from the NHS Commissioning Board, on new data to be made available in 2013:

“Commissioners will be expected to make improvement against the NHS Outcomes Framework.

To improve information, providers should by summer 2013 publish consultant-level data covering survival rates and quality of care for ten specialties including cardiac, vascular and orthopaedic surgery. Publication will be a contractual obligation in 2014/15 to allow comparison across hospitals.”

Also:

“The NHS CB will collect core clinical data from GP practices to help analysis of outcomes across pathways of care and encourage the integration of services. The NHS CB will also develop a comprehensive set of data for hospital care for 2014/15.”

One to watch.

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Hospital blunders investigated by Melanie Hall

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Help Me Investigate user Melanie Hall has been using Freedom of Information requests to look at ‘hospital blunders’: serious untoward incidents (SUIs) and ‘never events’. She reports:

“Surgeons operating on the wrong side of the body, swabs left inside patients after surgery and the wrong implant being used were among the blunders happening at NHS health services across England last year”

Overall, her investigation reveals at least 6,000 serious untoward incidents (SUIs) and more than 100 ‘never events’.  Continue reading →

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Who to send an FOI request to if you want to know about your local clinical commissioning group

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Following previous posts about how Freedom of Information requests are being handled during a period where responsibilities are passed from one part of the health service (primary care trusts) to another (clinical commissioning groups – CCGs), we’ve been working with the wonderful FOI Directory to compile a full list of email addresses for the PCT handling FOI requests for each CCG in England.

This table assumes that FOI requests are being handled by the PCT. In some cases the CCG may be ready to process FOI requests themselves. If so, the PCT should be able to inform you when you submit your FOI request.

Here’s the list – if you find anything that needs correcting or updating, please let us know. Continue reading →

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Identifying CCG websites – halfway there!

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Thanks to HMI contributors Che Seymour and Duarte Varela, we are now halfway to recording websites for clinical commissioning groups (CCGs).

The spreadsheet can be found here. It contains details on:

  • The CCG’s website news page
  • RSS feed
  • Twitter account
  • Board details URL
  • Freedom of Information details

Many CCGs don’t yet have a website, of course, as the authorisation process is still taking place and will not be completed until next Spring.

We’re hoping that compiling and sharing this information will make it easier to send FOI requests, as well as possibly leading to a ‘news scraper’ that brings together news from all CCGs into one convenient feed.

If you want to add to or update the details, please get in touch.

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What’s your local CCG doing? A quick guide

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Philip John is one of the users of Help Me Investigate looking at his local clinical commissioning group (CCG), for which there isn’t much information (there isn’t even a website).

Here’s why: CCGs are being authorised in four waves, which take place from this month through to March 2013. In addition to those four waves, there are dozens of CCGs which were already operating as ‘pathfinder’ groups – in other words, pilots.

You can find out which wave your CCG is in by searching for it in this document (PDF). Continue reading →

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The Organ Donor Register – unearthing the subtle trends

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Last time I told you about the overarching trends in the Donor Register; the fact its growth has flatlined, that women outnumber men, the best represented region is Scotland and most people join via the DVLA. In this post I thought I might tell you about the less obvious and harder-to-detect trends, which came to light via judicious use of pivot tables.

Continue reading →

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The Organ Donor Register – some themes and some visualisations

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So to paraphrase Loyd Grossman I’ve deliberated, cogitated and digested my donor data and thought I’d share some of the big themes and patterns I’ve noticed.

First, with its current total standing at 18.45m members, the register has grown massively since its computerised and centralised debut in 1994 – in that year it had just 104k signees.

Continue reading →

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Unearthing some trends in the organ donor register

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Since I last posted, I’ve been immersed in donor data – trying to tease out some interesting trends and perhaps, more importantly, attempting to find out what’s behind them.

I have data going right back to the computerised register’s inception in 1994. And without too much investigation, I can see that take-up has massively plateaued in the last three or four years; a huge peak in the mid-90s has calmed to a mere undulation, even with extra publicity for the register and the mushrooming of joining methods.

Continue reading →

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Giving data depth: analysing the NHS donor register

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In the last post I introduced you to my data project on the organ donor register – and since then, the topic has cropped up again in the news agenda. Via a Google Alert, I electonically stumbled across an impassioned campaign by the Glasgow Evening Times to change Scottish donation laws so consent is presumed unless a person specifically opts out. The paper has accompanied its vociferous championing with a series of stirring case-study pieces.

Which brings me back to my data.

Continue reading →

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