title: Increasing Access to Health Administrative Data with ICES Data & Analytic Services.
abstract: The Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES) is one of only a few organizations in Ontario permitted to access, link and analyze health administrative data for the purpose of generating evidence to inform decisions in policy and practice. Although ICES is a leading research institute, its access to the data has historically been restricted to scientists with an ICES affiliation. This requirement, designed to meet ICES' data privacy and security obligations, created barriers with respect to the widespread use of Ontario's data assets. In 2014, as part of the government's commitment to the Strategy for Patient-Oriented Research, ICES launched the Data & Analytic Services platform, which is aimed at increasing access to data and analytic services to investigators external to ICES. In making the data widely available to the broader research community, this initiative engages investigators involved in front-line care, stimulates new avenues of research and fosters collaboration that was previously challenging or unfeasible.
authors.affiliation: Research project manager at ICES for Data & Analytic Services.
authors.forename: Lisa
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Ishiguro
authors.affiliation: Staff scientist at ICES for Data & Analytic Services and an adjunct professor at the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation at the University of Toronto.
authors.forename: Refik
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Saskin
authors.affiliation: Staff scientist at ICES for the Applied Health Research Question portfolio.
authors.forename: Marian J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Vermeulen
authors.affiliation: Senior research project manager at ICES for the Applied Health Research Question portfolio.
authors.forename: Erika
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Yates
authors.affiliation: Senior analyst at ICES for Data & Analytic Services.
authors.forename: Nadia
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Gunraj
authors.affiliation: Senior director, research and data, at ICES and a lecturer at the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation at the University of Toronto.
authors.forename: J Charles
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Victor
mesh_terms: D000047:Academies and Institutes; D003219:Confidentiality; D066289:Data Curation; D016208:Databases, Factual; D006801:Humans; D033181:Information Dissemination; D009864:Ontario; D013223:Statistics as Topic