The world of data is changing dramatically right before our eyes – from the amount of data being produced to the way in which it’s structured and used. This trend, generally referred to as "big data," presents enormous challenges, but it also presents incredible opportunities. Our infographic helps you visualize some of the latest trends. 

The project identified a sizeable ‘mobile’ population with hospital records in more than one state. Research studies that focus on a single jurisdiction will under-enumerate the extent of hospital usage by individuals in the population. It is important that researchers understand and are aware of the impact of this missing hospital activity on their studies. The project highlights the need for an efficient and accurate data linkage system to support national research across Australia.

The demand for, and complexity of, linkage services is growing. This presents as a challenge to SLUs as they seek to service the varying needs of dozens of research projects annually. Linkage units need to be both flexible and scalable to meet this demand. It is hoped the solutions presented here can help mitigate these difficulties.

National e-health standards now cover key areas such as accurately identifying healthcare providers and consumers (national health identifiers), secure messaging, and repositories for personally-controlled electronic health records (PCEHRs). These standards attempt to address information privacy concerns and mandate security mechanisms to protect consumers’ sensitive health information.

This fact sheet is for people whose registered Medicare address is in areas of Australia outside Northern Queensland and Nepean Blue Mountains in NSW. The fact sheet sets out what you are consenting to when you register for a My Health Record, and in what situations further consent may need to be sought. It also discusses the meaning of consent.

This strategy aims to provide a pathway for Australian Government agencies to follow as they consider the use of big data to support their operations. This strategy aims to assist agencies in achieving productivity gains, through better service delivery and policy development while ensuring the privacy of individuals remains protected.

What is Data Linkage? How it protects peoples Privacy and enables Research on a wide range of dataset using de-Identified data?

This short animation explains what Population Data BC does, how we do it, and how population health research benefits all of us.

Researchers from the Effective Health Care Program’s DEcIDE Network authored this 11-chapter guide that aims to serve as a resource for researchers when developing observational comparative effectiveness research (CER) studies. The user's guide identifies best practices for designing observational CER studies and standardizes the review of study protocols with checklists in each chapter. Topics in this user's guide include developing study objectives and questions, study design, data sources, and analysis.

The data held by Medicare Australia can be of significant value as a complementary source of information to trials or observational studies. This factsheet provides an introduction to the use of this data for research.