Data-based insights into patients' journeys from diagnosis to treatment and beyond helps us build a more complete picture of their experience, with the opportunity to identify factors that contribute to different outcomes.
Since cancer and other healthcare services are delivered in various locations and settings, health data is often collected in isolation, siloed in separate systems, and bound by governance complexities and other challenges, preventing its use for effective, scalable health services research.
Connecting healthcare data from primary care and hospitals is essential to understanding the factors that contribute to delayed cancer diagnosis and treatment, affecting patient outcomes and ongoing health issues.
When cancer patients are diagnosed and move from primary to hospital care, and back for post-treatment care, this can impact how their health issues are identified and solved.
Bringing together data sources can build a more complete picture of how and where patients access care, how they’re being diagnosed and their quality of life after treatment.
There is significant evidence that health data usage is a major capability gap in Australian health and medical research.
Accessing and sharing health data, and promoting data-driven research, is a key priority for VCCC Alliance members. The alliance provides an ideal environment to enable access, linkage and analysis of health data from across Victoria for research purposes.
VCCC Alliance Data Connect enables more rapid translation of the latest advances in cancer research by increasing the amount, quality and impact of data-driven research focused on patient outcomes.
As types of health data continue to grow, it is imperative that barriers to access and use do not limit its utility for public benefit.
"By linking data that better reflects how patients experience care between different services, we can advocate for system-wide innovation and integration, reducing duplication of efforts and delivering care when and where it is needed most.”
- Prof Jon Emery, Primary Care Research and Education Lead
