Yes / Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the potential of using primary
care optometry data to support ophthalmic public health, research and policy
making.
Methods: Suppliers of optometric electronic patient record systems (EPRs) were
interviewed to gather information about the data present in commercial software
programmes and the feasibility of data extraction. Researchers were presented
with a list of metrics that might be included in an optometric practice dataset via
a survey circulated by email to 102 researchers known to have an interest in eye
health. Respondents rated the importance of each metric for research. A further
survey presented the list of metrics to 2000 randomly selected members of the
College of Optometrists. The optometrists were asked to specify how likely they
were to enter information about each metric in a routine sight test consultation.
They were also asked if data were entered as free text, menus or a combination of
these.
Results: Current EPRs allowed the input of data relating to the metrics of interest.
Most data entry was free text. There was a good match between high priority metrics
for research and those commonly recorded in optometric practice.
Conclusions: Although there were plenty of electronic data in optometric practice,
this was highly variable and often not in an easily analysed format. To facilitate
analysis of the evidence for public health purposes a UK based minimum
dataset containing standardised clinical information is recommended. Further
research would be required to develop suitable coding for the individual metrics
included. The dataset would need to capture information from all sectors of the
population to ensure effective planning of any future interventions.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:BRADFORD/oai:bradscholars.brad.ac.uk:10454/8721 |
| Date | 19 May 2016 |
| Creators | Slade, S.V., Davey, Christopher J., Shickle, D. |
| Source Sets | Bradford Scholars |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Article, Published version |
| Rights | © 2016 The Authors Ophthalmic and Physiological Optics published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of College of Optometrists. Ophthalmic & Physiological Optics 36 (2016) 503–511 This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited., CC-BY |
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