Sources utilised from the Western Cape Provincial Health Data Centre A single consolidated environment which houses individuated patient-level health data for the Western Cape | |||
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Routine hospital information systems | Child Healthcare Problem Identification Programme | Death Notification (DN) Surveillance | |
Brief description | Routine hospital information systems in the province capturing key information for each admission, including the unique patient identifier, patient demographics and hospital administration data, and discharge codes and summaries | An audit process of all in-hospital child (0–18 years) deaths in public health facilities that participate voluntarily | All deaths, in- or out-of-hospital, are recorded once the DN forms have been captured by the DHA. These data were leveraged for DN with cause of death data being shared with the DoH |
Time period | 01/01/2007–01/12/2021 | 23/05/2007–08/02/2021 | 01/01/2010–01/12/2013 |
Coverage | All public hospitals capturing in-facility deaths since the date when electronic admission and discharge data were networked into the WCPHDC.* | Selected public health facilities that voluntarily participate, thereby only capturing in-facility deaths in participating facilities | All notified deaths in the province, in- or out-of-hospital. For this study, we restricted to in-facility deaths |
Source of death reporting | Admission ICD-10 coding (primary, subsidiary and secondary 1–10) from clinical records | Cause of death as determined by clinical audit | Cause of death as recorded on DN form |
Variables | Date of death, ICD-10 codes (to determine proxy cause of death), and hospital admission date | Date of death, cause of death, and hospital admission date | Date of death and cause of death |
Frequency of data source updates to the WCPHDC | Daily | Approximately annually | No longer provided |
Advantages | Complete and timeous recording of all deaths in facilities with electronic data capture as every separation requires an entry | Reports in depth information on child deaths, including modifiable factors. Reports are available timeously | Includes all deaths (public and private health sector, and out-of-hospital deaths) associated causes |
Disadvantages | Only available for public health facilities and in-hospital deaths. The cause of death is not explicitly coded, but has to be inferred from the diagnostic code for the admission during which the death occurred | Not all public health facilities participate (voluntary). Private sector death information is not included | Cannot be used for short/medium term planning due to the reporting delay (2 years) Contributing or modifiable factors are not recorded Deaths are underreported (not reported or form does not reach the DHA), incomplete or incorrect. Deaths are also not available for foreign nationals without a South African identification number. Data are collated nationally and individual cause of death data is not provided to provincial health departments. Aggregate mortality data are only provided at the level of the province and not for smaller geographic areas |