bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Using administrative data sources to better understand student migration and circular travel patterns
Authors: Spilsbury Rebecca 
Published: November 2019

The ONS is transforming the way we produce migration statistics, to better meet our users’ needs. We are currently progressing a transformation programme to put administrative data at the core of our evidence on international migration.
We currently use the International Passenger Survey (IPS) to produce estimates of international migration to and from the UK. Our new analysis of circular patterns of movement using Home Office administrative data clearly demonstrates the complexity of the travel patterns we see in the data. Looking at individuals who arrived in the UK on non-visit visas and their travel patterns for the following two-year period, we were able to identify a range of circular journeys into and out of the country.
There is therefore potential to produce statistics on circular migration in future, so we are exploring how we can do this using linked administrative data.
Main Aim

To analyse circular travel patterns and see how these migrants may fit into our traditional definitions of international migrants
To obtain the most common visa types, travel patterns, nationality and length of stay.
To produce counts of potential circular migrants.

We have analysed a three-year extract of Home Office Exit Checks data to identify circular patterns of movement for non-EU nationals whose journey started on a non-visit visa.
We published our first outputs in January 2019, where we categorised people by how frequently they travelled, length of stay and demographic information. Since then we have investigated short-term circular journeys and determined common visa types, counts and travel patterns.
Circular migrants are not a homogenous group as they have wide-ranging travel patterns. The results from this exploratory analysis have provided evidence of short-term migrant travel patterns which will aid our understanding of these migrant movement types.
Social services Interventions and the Mental Health and Mortality of care leavers: a population based data linkage study in Northern Ireland and Finland
Authors: Maguire Aideen , Kouvonen Anne , O'Reilly Dermot , Remes Hanna , Pitkänen Joonas , Martikainen Pekka 
Published: November 2019

BackgroundResearch has highlighted the poor mental health of looked after children compared to those never in care. However, little is known on what becomes of these children and their mental health trajectories after they leave the care of social services. In addition, previous studies are limited in their ability to differentiate between type of social care intervention received; kinship care, foster care or residential care.
AimTo utilise nationwide social services data from two countries (Northern Ireland (NI) and Finland), with similar populations but different intervention policies, linked to a range of demographic and health datasets to examine the mental health outcomes of young adults in the years following leaving care.
MethodsData from both countries on children born 1991-2000 were linked to social services data, hospital admissions, prescribed medication data and death records. Mental health outcomes were defined after the age of 18years (when statutory care provision ends) examined by care intervention and included admissions to psychiatric hospital, for self-harm and death by suicide.
ResultsThe gender split in care in Finland is reflective of the population but more males are in care in NI. Initial results from Finnish data suggest those exposed to care in childhood have an increased risk of self-harm, psychiatric hospital admission and suicide after the age of 18years compared to those never in care. After adjusting for gender, age of entry to care and deprivation at birth those exposed to any care intervention had 3 times the risk of suicide (HR=3.06, 95% CI 1.18,7.98). Risk increased with duration in care but was equivalent across care intervention types. Analysis on the NI data is underway.
ConclusionFull results will be available December 2019 and will explore which care pathways are most associated with poor mental health outcomes informing discussion around intervention opportunities and policy.
The safety of Waterbirth in the UK: a feasibility study of routine data linkage – The POOL Study
Authors: Lugg-Widger Fiona , Barlow Christian , Cannings-John Rebecca , Gale Chris , Milton Rebecca , Robling Mike , Sanders Julia 
Published: November 2019

BackgroundPOOL is a cohort study designed to establish whether waterbirth, compared to leaving a pool prior to birth, is as safe for mothers and infants. It is a novel case study using routine maternity and neonatal data for research purposes, including the adaptation and addition of locally collected electronic data at sites.
AimWe aimed to establish the feasibility of the study design, which combines data from maternity information systems(MIS) and neonatal data using a dissent-based linkage model and the addition of new variables into the MIS.
MethodsThe study will utilise individual level data entered into local MIS at 30 NHS Trusts linked with the National Neonatal Research Database(NNRD). New variables were added to one pilot site before rolling out to the remaining sites. A third party added the new variables, extracted data from the MIS to send to the study team and transferred data for matching to the NNRD, ensuring the study team receive only anonymised data. The feasibility study aimed to establish the quality and completion of the newly added variables, the levels of missingness for key outcomes from an extract of 4 years of retrospective data, and ensured the datasets could link using the study ID generated by our third party.
ResultsThe new variables were added into the MIS and data were extracted after a 10week pilot. New variables were present and had been entered as per specified metadata requirements. 23,140 records were extracted from the retrospective data and key variables assessed for missingness e.g.place of birth(<0.1% missing). The datasets could link using the studyID generated by the third party.
ConclusionThrough study set-up and in this pilot, we provide evidence that the main study is feasible, satisfies governance requirements and likely to generate data of sufficient quality to address our main research questions.
Using record linkage to test representativeness of an ageing cohort
Authors: Burns Frances , McKelvie Mische , Cruise Sharon , O'Reilly Dermot 
Published: November 2019

Background with rationaleThe numbers of older people are rising faster than any other group in society and Governments need to develop policies that will help older people stay as healthy and independent as possible for as long as possible. To do this they need to know what shapes the lives and health of older people and how they respond to their changing social, financial and health circumstances. Many countries are now investing in large and expensive ageing cohorts as omnibus studies to better understand the ageing processes and perhaps indicate how society can best prepare for an ageing population. These ageing cohorts (of people aged 50 and over) are invariably drawn from population-wide sampling frames and claim to be representative of the older populations, despite limitations in the sampling frame and modest response rates.
AimThe aim of this study was to examine the representativeness of the Northern Ireland Cohort for the Longitudinal Study of Ageing (NICOLA) cohort through linkage to administrative health and demographic data. Specifically, to determine if there were any age, sex, or area of residence differences in NICOLA participants and whether they were healthier than the rest of the population in terms of recent hospital attendance or proximity to care home admission and/or death. Logistic regression will be used to compare characteristics of participants and the rest of the Northern Ireland population aged 50 and over.
Data/MethodsAn identifier for each of the 8504 NICOLA Wave 1 participants was attached to the Health-card registration system which contains the HCN (the unique identifier) and thence to databases holding hospital admissions, mortality records and admissions to a care home.
ResultsThe data are currently in the safe setting, with analysis starting this week, and results expected early autumn.
Research Ready Data Lakes: Protecting Privacy in Relatable Datasets
Authors: McMillan Robert , Reeves Maggie 
Published: November 2019

Background with rationaleThe Georgia Policy Labs’ mission is to improve outcomes for children and families by producing rigorous research with long-term government partners. A key component of this model is having secure access to research-ready, individual level data from multiple sources to answer government agencies’ questions within policy windows. Obtaining sensitive data from our partners requires significant relationship building, demonstrations of value, and assurances of our ability to mitigate all security and privacy concerns.
Objectives

Securely transfer and de-identify disparate individual level datasets with personally identifiable information from public entities.
Clean data and store in a pristine data lake, made available for fast turn-around research.
Ensure individual records can be matched across disparate organizations’ datasets.

ApproachOur practices, infrastructure, data sharing agreements and security are built to support the intersection of data availability for researchers and security standards that give our partners ease. We highlight two solutions addressing security concerns while supporting our researchers, which can be used by other researchers using sensitive data. First, we discuss our multiple tiers of transfer and access that remove risk from identifiable data. Second, we share the double hash solution created for a partner who was not willing to share PII. We share the source code for our SHA3-512 double hash solution, which allows for matching of records across disparate datasets without receiving PII sensitive elements.
ResultsWe created reliable matching values without the need for the actual social security numbers or other PII values on our side, enabling a large school district to share its student-level data with us.
ConclusionThe balance of security and easy access for researchers is a common area of friction. Our security set-up and hashing solution allows others to remove this barrier for applied policy research.
Epilepsy Mortality in Wales: 2005-2017
Authors: Daniels Helen , Lacey Arron , Akbari Ashley , Powell Rob , Pickrell Owen 
Published: November 2019

BackgroundEpilepsy is a common, chronic neurological condition that affects 50 million people worldwide. The risk of premature death in people with epilepsy is up to three times higher than for the general population making this disease a significant public health concern. In England, there are around 3,100 deaths associated with epilepsy each year; 49 per cent of these deaths are premature. The mortality of epilepsy in Wales in recent years is currently unknown.
Main Aim To ascertain mortality figures for deaths associated with epilepsy in Wales.
MethodWe anonymously linked the Annual District Death Extract and the Welsh Demographics Service datasets within the Secure Anonymised Information Linkage Databank. Using ICD-10 codes for epilepsy, we identified all people who died with a mention of epilepsy on their death certificate, date of their death, and age at death between 2005 and 2017. Number of deaths per year were summed for each year. We also calculated the proportion of premature deaths and mean age at death for each year. All-cause mortality figures were collated as comparators.
ResultsDuring the study period, there were around 173 deaths associated with epilepsy in Wales each year. The proportion of epilepsy-associated deaths compared with all-cause deaths increased almost two-fold during this time. 54% of all deaths associated with epilepsy occurred under the age of 75 years, compared with 33 per cent of all-cause deaths. The mean age at death for people with epilepsy is 67 years; 11 years younger than all-cause deaths (78 years).
ConclusionThe number of deaths associated with epilepsy is increasing every year in Wales. These figures also show that having epilepsy reduces life expectancy. More research is needed into the causes of epilepsy-associated deaths to inform policy and improve outcomes for this patient group.
Allocating Unique Property Reference Numbers (UPRNs) to general practitioner-recorded patient addresses using a deterministic address-matching algorithm: evaluation of representativeness and bias in an ethnically-diverse inner city population
Authors: Harper Gill , Stables David , Boomla Kambiz , Robson John , Fry Richard , Ahmed Zaheer , Dezateux Carol 
Published: November 2019

Background with rationalePseudonymised UPRNs based on patient addresses can be used to link environmental information to electronic health records (EHRs), however the representativeness and potential demographic or health-related biases in linkage using existing address-matching algorithms have not been evaluated using patient addresses.
Main AimTo evaluate representativeness and bias in assigning UPRNs using an address-matching algorithm based on general practitioner (GP)-recorded patient addresses for a geographically-defined multi-ethnic inner city population.
MethodsWe evaluated the Discovery Programme deterministic address-matching algorithm, comprising 213 rules applied, in rank order of minimising false positives, to the GP-recorded address of 879,286 (48% female) patients currently registered with all GP practices in four boroughs in inner east London.
We used logistic regression to estimate the adjusted odds (aOR) of an address not being linked to a UPRN by: age band (reference group: <1 year), sex (female), ethnic group (White British), Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) quintile (most deprived), number of long-term conditions (none); and timing of GP registration (most recent quartile). We evaluated the linkage and algorithm error rates in an independent validated NHS address dataset using best practice linkage reporting standards.
Results99% of patients had a UPRN assigned. Men (aOR;95%CI:0.87;0.8,0.91), and patients aged 15-19 (0.51;0.39,0.68), 20-24 (0.67;0.51,0.89), or ≥90 years (0.35;0.83,0.91), of Chinese ethnic background (95% CI; 0.50; 0.45,0.56), or living in the least deprived IMD quintile (0.24; 0.20,0.30) were less likely, and those with a GP-registration preceding mid-2016 (p-value0.00) more likely, to have a UPRN assigned. The sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive-values and F-measure of the algorithm were, respectively: 0.993, 0.019, 0.914, 0.204, and 0.9516.
ConclusionWe have demonstrated, for the first time, a high GP-address UPRN match rate and quantified error rates and biases for users. Further work is needed to investigate addresses in patients with more complex address histories.
Self-harm presentation across healthcare settings by sex in young people
Authors: Marchant Amanda , Turner Samantha , Balbuena Lloyd , Peters Evyn , Williams Dave , Lloyd Keith , Lyons Ronan , John Ann 
Published: November 2019

BackgroundAccurate data on self-harm is crucial to suicide prevention efforts. It has been previously found that around twice as many people who self-harm seek help in primary care than in secondary care. Little is known about how contacts for self-harm differ across settings at a population level. This study utilised individual-level linked data across GP, Emergency Departments (ED), outpatients and hospital admissions examining contacts across settings and time by sex for self-harm in 10-24 year olds.
MethodsA whole-population based e-cohort study of routinely collected healthcare data was conducted. Rates of self-harm across settings over time by sex were examined. Individuals were categorised based on the service(s) to which they presented.
ResultsA total of 937,697 individuals aged 10-24 years contributed 5,369,794 person years of data from the 01.01.2003-30.09.2015. There were differences in self-harm contacts by demographic variables particularly with regards to sex and admissions to hospital following ED attendance.
ConclusionThis is the first study to compare self-harm in people aged 10-24 years across primary care, EDs, and hospital settings in the UK. The high rates of self-harm in primary care and for young men in EDs highlight these as important settings for intervention. Understanding patterns of presentation will inform service planning and configuration for follow-up care and could inform tailored support, for example for males in ED. Linked data provides important evidence to support the development of interventions across healthcare settings.
A Victim-Focused Response to Repeat Fraud and Computer Misuse Crimes: Challenges and Opportunities through Admin Data Linkage
Authors: Correia Sara 
Published: November 2019

Background with rationaleThe volume of Fraud and Computer Misuse victimisation in the UK is estimated to be nearly equivalent to all other crime types combined. Alongside this, the Victims’ Charter establishes enhanced rights for vulnerable victims, a category which includes repeat victims, placing a responsibility on criminal justice agencies to assess vulnerability and respond accordingly. However, identifying repeat victimisation is challenging and the relationship between reported repeat victimisation and vulnerability requires empirical scrutiny.
Main aimThis presentation draws on PhD research funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and conducted in collaboration with the Southern Wales Regional Organised Crime Unit (ROCU), to profile victims of fraud and computer misuse in Wales. It presents the methodological challenges and lessons learnt from linking administrative crime records to identify and profile repeat victims of fraud and computer misuse across the four Welsh police forces.
Methods/ApproachThis research utilised a sample of all incidents reported within the Welsh police force areas over a period of two years (1st October 2014 to 30th September 2016). A mixture of exact and probabilistic matching was used to match records relating to the same victim, leveraging R’s RecordLinkage package in conjunction with Tidyverse. A variety of descriptive and inferential statistics were used to summarise key relationships within the resulting linked dataset.
Results & ConclusionLinking crime records presents considerable methodological challenges related to data quality and the availability and accessibility of linkage tools. These difficulties impair the assessment of vulnerability which is demanded of criminal justice agencies. Despite their limitations however, crime records can be used to provide new insights into the nature of repeat victimisation and the characteristics of victims who report being repeatedly victimised.
Building a birth cohort of births and their outcome in England and Wales using linkage of administrative data
Authors: Macfarlane Alison , Dattani Nirupa 
Published: November 2019

Background/rationaleWhen a baby is born in England and Wales, the event is recorded in several separate systems, each of which contains different data items. Data recorded at birth registration are mainly socio-demographic, while some different data items are recorded when the birth is notified to the NHS. The data recorded in hospital systems in England and in Wales about the majority of babies who are born in NHS maternity units are largely clinical.
Over a ten year period, a series of three collaborative projects have linked data about 7,013,804 births registered in 2005-14 to establish a birth cohort for use in research and national statistics and to quality assure the linkage. Data about outcomes of birth in terms of death and subsequent readmissions to hospital have also been linked in. The linked data are held in the Secure Research Service at the Office for National Statistics.
The data have been used for analyses of pattern of births by time of day, day of the week and season and in relation to obstetric intervention in labour and birth. They are now being used by other researchers.
strong>Challenges encounteredThere were major problems in accessing NHS data for England, compounded by intermittent availability of funding.
Lessons learnedDespite the many challenges, it proved feasible to construct a linked birth cohort which has increased the scope and range of national maternity data for England and Wales. NHS Digital’s opt-outs are causing gaps in national data and could invalidate linkage.
RecommendationsThe cohort should be updated with data for more recent years. Linkage should be undertaken within ONS by teams who are not subject to NHS Digital’s opt-out policy. Data access policies should reflect the higher public trust in research uses of NHS data compared to commercial uses.
How do numbers of births in England and Wales vary by time of day, day of the week and place of birth? An analysis using linked administrative data
Authors: Macfarlane Alison , Dattani Nirupa 
Published: November 2019

BackgroundClinical policies have aimed at increase the proportion of births occurring during working hours on weekdays in the belief that this facilitates staffing and is safer for mothers and babies. Our recent analyses of hospital births have shown that that planned caesareans are concentrated into weekday mornings. In contrast, spontaneous births after spontaneous onset of labour are more likely in the hours after midnight, peaking from 4-6am. Births after induced labours are more likely in the hours around midnight.
Main AimTo compare the timing of births of births at home and elsewhere with timing in NHS hospitals.
MethodData from civil registration of births from 2005 to 2014 in England and Wales were linked to data recorded when newborn babies are notified to the NHS. Data about babies born in NHS maternity units were further linked to hospital data for England and for Wales. Data were analysed in the secure facilities of the Office for National Statistics’ Secure Research Service. Analysis was by place of birth recorded at birth registration.
ResultsNumbers of singleton births in freestanding midwifery units and at home were highest from midnight to 7am, peaking from 4am-6am. Births on non-hospital sites followed a similar pattern with a flatter peak from 4am-8am, but peaks in non-maternity hospitals tended to occur during mornings. Births in military hospitals had a sharp peak at 8am and births in private hospitals had a peak in the morning and then again in early and late afternoon.
ConclusionConclusion The small numbers of births in hospitals without maternity units or ‘elsewhere’ are unlikely to have occurred there intentionally, but the latter, along with home and midwifery unit births were more common at night. This has implications for staffing. A newly funded project will explore relative safety.