The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW), as Australia’s national agency for health and welfare statistics, holds a wide range of health and welfare datasets that support research, policy development and reporting.
One of the most commonly requested datasets by both internal analysts and external researchers is the Admitted Patient Care (APC) National Minimum Dataset (NMDS), which contains records of hospitalisations across all public and private hospitals in Australia. Currently, the collation of this care data requires intensive data harmonisation activities to enable comprehensive, cross-jurisdictional and cross-dataset health research.
A new collaboration between the Australian Research Data Commons (ARDC) and the AIHW aims to address this challenge by improving the consistency and usability of national hospital data. By standardising how hospital data are structured, the project supports more efficient analysis and contributes to stronger evidence to inform healthcare policy and research.
To solve the challenge of fragmented data, the project will convert a sample of APC data into the Observational Medical Outcomes Partnership (OMOP) Common Data Model (CDM). This international standard allows different types of health data to be integrated seamlessly. It unlocks the full potential of these data integration activities by optimising their discoverability, accessibility and usability for health researchers.
This project will also establish a reproducible, automated methodology to ensure that future hospital data can be converted and included, creating an enduring and consistent national health asset for Australia.
“By partnering with the ARDC on this initiative, we are helping to establish a common language for hospital data to meet the needs of diverse audiences such as state, territory and federal government agencies, universities, research centres, and non-government organisations. Standardising APC data through OMOP will streamline analysis and support more timely, evidence‑based insights into Australia’s health system.”
- Louise Gates, AIHW’s Executive Director, Health Insight
Academic researchers and government analysts will benefit from faster access to standardised, nationally harmonised data, which enables more sophisticated reporting and analysis capacities.
Data custodians and holders will see improved data quality through the implementation of international assessment tools, ensuring the consistency and reliability of their datasets.
Ultimately, these improvements enable policy makers to use more sophisticated reporting and analytics to inform evidence-based decision-making across both public and private health sectors.
Aligning this key national dataset to an internationally recognised standard will make these data easier to analyse, compare, and integrate with other health data sources, both domestically and globally.
Converting APC data to the OMOP CDM will:
