Data Access
ScottisH Informatics Programme (SHIP) Infrastructure
The ScottisH Informatics Programme (SHIP) infrastructure provided by ISD supports research by providing expertise in study design, facilitating research approvals and providing datasets, including linked data in a secure environment. Our work supports researchers to analyse and interpret complex datasets, answering key questions about our society. To deliver SHIP, ISD operates a state-of-the-art technical infrastructure managed by the ATOS Origin Alliance. This environment provides a high powered computing service, secure analytic environment, secure file transfer protocol, and provision of a range of analytic software (SPSS, STATA, SAS and R). This powerful technical infrastructure is available through your Research Coordinator, the single point of contact to ensure your study runs smoothly from beginning to end. Our research coordinators:
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Help researchers to finalise their study design by providing expert advice on study feasibility. Using their extensive knowledge of health datasets they assist in defining what data are available coupled with relative strengths and weakness of datasets and their fitness for the proposed study
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Liaise with you and other involved parties to build relationships, agree deliverables and timelines
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Facilitate completion of the permissions (i.e. ethics and Privacy Advisory Committee (PAC))
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Liaise with all parties involved including ISD’s Indexing Service, the ATOS safe haven, and data suppliers (both internal and external) to provision data within the safe haven.
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Liaise or provide analytical capacity to undertake the analyses on behalf of customers if required.
This new technical infrastructure coupled with ISD’s wealth of national datasets, researcher coordinator services and proportional information governance; position ISD to enable responsible and secure access to linked data that allows bona fide researchers to pursue answers to questions that benefit society.
To contact a Research Coordinator please use our central email address at NSS.ISDMedicalRecordLinkage@nhs.net.
For a contact regarding the PAC process, please use NSS.PAC@nhs.net