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- BLOG - Access to secure data during the Covid-19 pandemic - a model for the future?
- Covid-19 and Care Homes: Advances in Administrative Data Research during the pandemic
- DATA INSIGHTS -Deprivation and informal care at the end of life
- BLOG - Reflections on engaging with children & young people about data
- NEWS - Innovative new residential linkage tool launched
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home- No.4
- DATA INSIGHTS - Youth Movements, Social Mobility and Health Inequalities
- NEWS - New report warns of deepening poverty crisis for Scottish families
- New report on Infants Born into Care in Scotland
- Spotlight on Dr Elizabeth Lemmon
- Spotlight on Jan Savinc
- BLOG - Covid-19 fines in Scotland: What we know so far
- BLOG - The value of social science and administrative data research in Scotland: how we are helping respond to COVID-19
- NEWS - Joining together with Research Data Scotland to co-host existing public panel on data
- DATA INSIGHTS - Exploring illegal drug consignments in Scotland
- DATA INSIGHTS -Linking two administrative data sets about looked after children
- NEWS - ADR UK grants 20 PhD studentship opportunities focused on quantitative research using linked administrative data
- NEWS – ADR Scotland data ambassadors launched
- Spotlight on Peter Christen
- The importance of administrative data
- Virtual Conference - Data Linkage: Information to Impact
- An Introduction to Data Science for Administrative Data Research course - March 2023
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home - No.7
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home- No.3
- DATA INSIGHTS - Investigating the effects of class composition and class size on pupils’ attainment in Scottish primary schools
- NEWS - New opportunity to join ADR Scotland’s Public Panel
- BLOG - Engaging the public through our public panel
- BLOG - Exploring the potential of synthetic data
- Children’s Health in Care in Scotland (CHiCS)
- DATA INSIGHTS - Automatic Coding of Occupations: Methods to create the Scottish Historic Population Database (SHPD)
- DATA INSIGHTS - Selective schools: do they improve health?
- DATA INSIGHTS - Were people who died at home less likely to attend hospital at the end of life during the Covid pandemic?
- EVENT - Active Travel: New Data, New Insights
- EVENT - Holyrood Evidence Week: Doing Data Better for Policy and Public Good
- EVENT - Unlocking criminal justice data in Scotland: Findings from Data First
- IPDLN Conference - Data linkage research: informing policy and practice
- NEWS - Making nursing data available to inform policy
- NEWS - New report on The Impact of Covid-19 on Children’s Care Journeys in Scotland: An Analysis of the Administrative Data on 'Looked After' Children
- NEWS - Updated report on Infants Born into Care in Scotland
- Scout and Guide participation boosts later life health
- BLOG - Geospatial Ambitions
- BLOG - Taking historical death records and developing a database for future analysis
- BLOG - Unlocking criminal justice data
- DATA INSIGHTS - Community mortality due to Covid-19
- DATA INSIGHTS - What makes people more likely to cycle to work?
- Future-proofing investment into administrative data research announced in Scotland
- NEWS - Understanding the dynamics of the nursing workforce: the potential of routinely collected data
- Spotlight on Joanna Soraghan
- Spotlight on Katherine Falconer
- Why misconceptions about population data can lead to bad outcomes
- ADR Scotland publishes its strategy for 2022-2026
- BLOG - Developing and re-shaping our public panel
- BLOG - Review of the recent DWP Areas of Research Interest Workshop
- BLOG: Developing a cross-national research agenda on crime and convictions
- BLOG: Working together to make a difference with data
- DATA INSIGHTS - Homelessness duration in Scotland: how long does rehousing take?
- DATA INSIGHTS - Occupation and COVID-19 deaths: Scotland in a comparative perspective
- DATA INSIGHTS -The health and economic benefits of active commuting in Scotland
- EVENT - ADR UK Conference 2023
- EVENT - RSE The secret world of data
- NEWS - New comic on children's rights and data
- NEWS - Report published on our children’s engagement pilot study
- NEWS - When did fines issued by the police for breaking Covid rules peak?
- Scotland’s portfolios: Research and Statistical Data - building a new approach to thematic data linkage
- Spotlight on Cecilia Macintyre
- Spotlight on Dr Evan Williams
- Spotlight on Fernando Pantoja
- Spotlight on Laurie Berrie
- ADR Scotland Winter Partnership Session - **internal event**
- BLOG - AGEING AND HOMELESSNESS IN SCOTLAND
- BLOG - Can we use linked administrative data to identify social disadvantage?
- BLOG - Commuting and its impact on health
- BLOG - The Dynamics of the Nursing Workforce in the UK: Using data to support our nurses
- BLOG: Growing up in kinship care
- Congratulations to Alastair McAlpine, the new Chief Statistician for Scottish Government
- DATA INSIGHTS - Analysing a season of death and excess mortality in Scotland’s past
- EVENT - ADR UK Virtual Half Day event
- EVENT - HDR UK Conference: Data for global health and society
- EVENT - Introduction to Data Science for Administrative Data Research course (IDS-ADR)
- Event - Public data for public good: towards better understanding children's lives
- NEWS - ADR Scotland's first flagship dataset
- NEWS - Data research initiative secures £90 m funding extension
- NEWS: Our role supporting the new Covid-19 research data service in Scotland
- Spotlight on Gina Anghelescu
- Spotlight on Michelle K Jamieson
- Webinar - An Introduction to Looked-After Children Dataset
- ADR Scotland Away Day (**for staff only**)
- BLOG - An Inside Job: Using Criminology, Police Data and a Lot of Nouse
- BLOG - Improving justice data to promote data justice in Scotland
- BLOG - Location of death in 2020: a changing trend from hospitals to homes
- BLOG - Reflecting on the ADR UK Conference: Insights from our new PhD Researchers
- BLOG - Seeking feedback on Research Data Scotland’s core principles via our public panel
- BLOG - What skills, training and support are required by those wishing a career as an administrative data researcher?
- BLOG No. 9 - Final blog in this 'deaths at home' series
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home - No. 6
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home - No.8
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home- No.5
- BLOG: 5 things I've learnt about working with policymakers...
- BLOG: Automating Coding for Large Historical Datasets
- BLOG: COVID-19- How increased deaths at home impact the carer community
- DATA INSIGHTS -Postal deliveries of drugs in Scotland
- EVENT - 'Getting things done with data in government'
- EVENT - Linking public sector data for research: an ADR UK showcase event
- EVENT Seminar - Administrative data for social policy research: potential and pitfalls
- NEWS - ADR Scotland launches new podcast series
- NEWS - Additional funding for Understanding Children’s Lives and Outcomes
- NEWS - Engaging children and young people
- NEWS: Police use of Fixed Penalty Notices under the Covid-19 regulations in Scotland: A new data report highlights links with deprivation and inequality
- NEWS: Police use of the new Covid-19 powers: Using administrative data to analyse and evaluate practice
- Research Data Scotland - New user forum
- Spotlight on Dr Patricio Troncoso
- Spotlight on Renata Samulnik
- Summary of ADR Scotland Winter Partnership session
- Directorship of the International Population Data Linkage Network (IPDLN) for 2021-22.
- BLOG: In the light of experience: InterRAI and the final thousand days of life
- Multiple health conditions and social care
- NEWS - Susan McVie elected as Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences
- SCADR relocates to the Bayes Centre
- EVENT: Four day introduction to using administrative data for social and health research
- BLOG: The value of administrative data: DALYs and the Scottish Burden of Disease study
- BLOG: Where to start with parliamentary and policy engagement
- EVENT - International Conference on Administrative Data Research, Cardiff
- EVENT - Using data to realise the potential of the 'Last 1000 days'
- EVENT: TalkingData: ADR Scotland mini-summit
- EVENT: “Let’s use data to save time, money and lives”: ADR Scotland partners gather for mini-summit
- EVENTS: ADR Scotland researchers present at international conference in Cardiff
BLOG - The value of social science and administrative data research in Scotland: how we are helping respond to Covid-19
As we enter new phases of the pandemic, how can administrative data help us to better understand what’s happened and inform policy and practice in preparation for potential future waves?
Covid-19 has had widespread ramifications across society. It has not just impacted on physical health and death rates, but on the economy, our environment, different forms of social care, the wellbeing of the population and, ultimately, the way we live our lives: from our patterns of working and schooling, modes of travel, holiday plans and interactions with services and each other.
Here at The Scottish Centre for Administrative Data Research (SCADR) we bring together an interdisciplinary range of researchers in criminology, social policy, population health, nursing and urban studies. Combining social science and data expertise, we develop evidence-based insights from analysis of public sector data. In response to this crisis, we are striving to better understand the impact of the pandemic on society, in particular how it has affected different parts of the population and examining the non-medical factors that may impact on outcomes.
Working with Scottish Government, our ADR Scotland partner, we have supported the development of the COVID-19 data holding in Scotland to ensure timely and secure access to data and help provide answers to key analytical and research questions around the effects of COVID-19 on health, care and society. SCADR Director, Professor Chris Dibben, explains “The Covid-19 pandemic has required information and analysis at unprecedented speeds. For some emerging questions there has been no existing source of information. SCADR, using its deep understanding of existing administrative data systems, has worked with colleagues across many organisations to identify novel ways of identifying key indicators and societal structures to help address these questions.”
One example of our developing research in this area is better understanding the impact of COVID-19 on the care home population, led by Dr David Henderson. This is a key demographic where publicly available data sources do not provide a clear picture and more detailed analysis is needed to fully comprehend what has been happening and to better inform policy.
We will contribute to this work in Scotland by utilising the COVID-19 data holding to describe the characteristics of the population affected by the virus in ways that haven’t been available previously. In particular, the availability of primary care data and new methods of identifying care home residents in linked datasets are novel sources of information that can increase our understanding.
COVID-19 has also placed unprecedented restrictions on our civil liberties and freedom of movement. Our Safer Communities Lead, Professor Susan McVie, is part of an Independent Advisory Group (IAG) to review the temporary policing powers that were introduced to ensure that members of the public complied with the new Coronavirus Regulations in an effort to save lives. The IAG recognised the importance of ensuring that such powers should be scrutinised and Susan has played a significant role in ensuring a data-driven approach underpins this process. Her first data report presented a wealth of evidence based on analysis of various policing datasets. The analysis demonstrated that, despite concern about people breaching the Regulations, the police largely relied on engagement and encouragement to ensure compliance, resorting only in extreme cases to the use of enforcement. The data also showed distinct changes in demand for policing during lockdown, including increases in noise complaints, neighbour disputes and general public nuisance, with reductions in road traffic incidents, assaults and theft; and yet police response remained high and the level of complaints to the police did not increase.
The findings from the report were presented to the Scottish Police Authority (SPA) Board in June and discussed further at a webinar in July where senior members of the SPA and Police Scotland highlighted the value of data and evidence in supporting scrutiny and evaluation. Susan continues to support the work of the IAG and her second data report is due to be published shortly.
This summary blog, highlights just some of our emerging research responding to Covid-19. Over time, administrative data provides a vital source in which to explore the longer term effects of the pandemic on society, such as on employment and educational outcomes, and can play an important part in informing an evidence-based recovery.
This article was published on 12 Aug 2020