INTEGRIS: Integration of European Injury Statistics
The idea of INTEGRIS, short for Integration of European Injury Statistics, is to validate the potential of the IDB to fulfil the requirements of the European statistical system by integrating these data with the existing hospital discharge registers (HDR).
The overall goal is to develop and evaluate a data model for the integration of routine and more detailed hospital data on injuries, namely thru linking the official HDR with the EUIDB. This integrated data model would enable hospitals to generate a standard injury data set from the routinely collected information with minimal additional efforts. Moreover, a methodology for gaining representativity of the integrated data model has to be developed and applied. The development of state-of-the-art electronic interfaces to streamline the data collection would be an important part of the project.
The INTEGRIS project aims to provide the necessary research and technology input for the IDB-HDR integration through an evaluated demonstration project in six Member States.
Background
In the 27 member states of the EU 60 million people receive medical treatment each year as a result of an injury. This is more than the whole population of Italy. Out of these more than 7 million have to be admitted to hospital, which is more than 19.000 people each day. More than 250.000 persons each year die from injuries. These key figures about the toll of accidents and injuries in the EU are well known, but there is lack of reliable indicators for the proportion that certain activities (e.g. sports), places (e.g. home and work) or products (e.g. footwear) have. These indicators about the so-called external causes are a prerequisite for injury prevention.
Even for the most serious consequences of non-fatal injuries - long-term impairments and disability - such indicators are missing. While so far no single European injury statistics can produce these indicators, the linkage of two existing data sources - the European Injury Prevention-oriented Database (IDB) and the Europe-wide standardized hospital discharge register (HDR) – provide a promising approach.
A major drawback in the use of current injury hospital data (from hospital discharge registers) for injury surveillance is the poor quality of these data, especially in the area of the so called “external causes of injuries” (e.g. mechanism of accident, place of occurrence). These external causes should be recorded for each individual injury case; actually, this information is rarely included in the current injury data set.
On the other hand detailed data on external causes are currently recorded within the European Injury Database (IDB). The IDB represents a small sample of hospitals in the participating countries (currently 12 MS). It covers all types of accidents and injuries including “rare events” such as intimate partner violence as well as disabilities from injuries.
The Project
The implementation of prevention-oriented injury surveillance in the EU is a major demand towards the Member States in the recent “EC Council Recommendations on the prevention of injury and the promotion of safety”. Needed in particular are valid and reliable indicators for the array of external causes of injury morbidity, like involved activities, products and mechanisms, and for the most severe consequences of injuries besides death – long term and chronic disabilities. Whereas no single EU health statistics fulfils that demand to date, the integration of two existing data sources – the prevention-oriented European Injury Database (IDB) and the routine Hospital Discharge Registers (HDR) – is considered the most promising approach to that avail.
This approach is INTEGRIS – Integration of European Injury Statistics and will receive funding from the European Commission’s 7th Framework Programme.
The KfV acts as the INTEGRIS Project-coordinator.
