PAS Introduction - Data quality

Good data quality is vital to ensure patient care is delivered effectively and accurately on a day to day basis throughout the NHS. Reliable data is essential for all staff involved with patient care from receptionists to clinical staff to secretaries.

Accurate information captured is essential for:

• Efficient delivery of safe patient care.
• Minimising clinical risk.
• Clinical Governance, which insists on accuracy
• Providing reliable information on the Trust performance in providing care.
• Funding.

It is imperative that patient details; name, date of birth, address, telephone and GP details are checked with the patient whenever they attend or are admitted to keep our hospital records up-to-date and accurate.

The Data Quality Team are a pro-active team responsible for monitoring and ensuring that patient data on hospital systems is accurate, complete and reliable. Their day to day tasks range from merging duplicate patient records, updating information that has been incorrectly entered; ensuring patient’s demographics are accurate and also dealing with adoption and transgender records.