The blueprint titled “The Open Data Era in Health and Social Care” developed for the National Health Service” (NHS England) shows how to initiate and accelerate an effective research and learning program to meet the needs of the open data era in health and social care. The blueprint was commissioned by NHS England and written by The GovLab, part of New York University and other world leaders involved in the field of open data usage.
NHS in England has actively moved towards open access to vast repositories of information used across its many agencies and departments. NHS England recognizes the immense potential given the proper safeguards of making such anonymized aggregated data available to patients, citizens, and researchers.
The blueprint suggests ways that the healthcare system can maximize the impact of sharing open data by establishing priorities and finding ways to measure the benefits. The report offers ideas on how NHS England can develop an evidence-based program to guide the investments and further research using the benefits of open data.
The blueprint discusses the kinds of evidence needed to help measure the impact of open data, methodologies that are the most effective at gathering actionable evidence, how to use evidence to differentiate and prioritize among various open data initiatives, and how to create an environment where data can be used to constantly generate and refresh information and learning.
According to Tim Kelsey, National Director for Patients and Information for NHS England, “There is an urgent need for the NHS to use better information and evidence to guide decision-making and investment. We know that with scientific and medical research, the rate of discovery is accelerated by having better access to data. This report will kick off a conversation on how we can use open data in the NHS to build a meaningful evidence base to support better investments in health and care services.”
As Stefaan Verhulst, Co-founder and Chief Research and Development Officer of the GovLab reports, “The blueprint lays out a detailed plan to start a conversation on how to gather the evidence needed to understand and assess the shape and size of the impact of open health data. It is important to pay a comparable level of attention to an analysis of open data’s potential benefits as well as potential risks.”
To download the full report go to www.thegovlab.org/nhs. For more information, contact Alan Kantrow, Chief Learning and Communications Officer for The GovLab at akantrow@gmail.com or call +1 781-475-8844.