Systems

Objective

To ensure that all clinical and administrative systems are configured in line with relevant Information Standards and NHS Data Models to provide appropriate levels of validation at the point of entry in order to quality assure data critical to the provision of high quality care, clinical and operational decision making and performance monitoring.

Benefit

Having in place an internal process that regularly reviews new and amended Information Standards and data models against current systems will ensure that both clinical and administrative systems remain compliant and data quality validations are focused in the right place.   Aligning system configuration to the latest standards and data models and, wherever possible, placing data validation at the point of entry will ensure data quality remains the responsibility of those entering the data. It also removes additional burden in subsequent data processing activities by staff not directly involved in delivering care.

Best Practice

There should be a process to review all new and updated Information Standards Notifications (ISNs) and accompanying Technical Output Specifications (or equivalent) in order to determine the impact on the current system. This should be supported by clinical and administrative representatives and system suppliers.  Impact statements should identify required changes (either through local configuration or development by the supplier) to maintain compliance with the standard, associated business rules and validations.   A development plan should then be established to deliver the change by the timeframe mandated within the ISN.  The process should also determine how best to apply data quality checks (as specified in the Technical Output Specifications) to any new or amended data items.  These should be applied at the point of entry but where not practical existing DQ reporting should be extended to cover new or amended data items.  Existing internal metrics (see Part 2 of the framework) should also be amended or extended to accommodate changes, particularly where data quality issues could impact delivery of care, clinical and operational decision making or performance.

There should also be a user forum in place to discuss and flag to system suppliers development requests for the same configuration changes required across organisations delivering the same or similar services.  This should be considered within the main solution to reduce effort and the risk of variance at a local level.