NHS Digital Data Release Register - reformatted
University Of Ulster projects
23 data files in total were disseminated unsafely (information about files used safely is missing for TRE/"system access" projects).
Hazardous, harmful and dependent drinking among adults living in England — DARS-NIC-112633-G0C0H
Type of data: information not disclosed for TRE projects
Opt outs honoured: Anonymised - ICO Code Compliant (Does not include the flow of confidential data)
Legal basis: Health and Social Care Act 2012 s261(1) and s261(2)(b)(ii), Health and Social Care Act 2012 s261(2)(b)(ii), Health and Social Care Act 2012 - s261 - 'Other dissemination of information'
Purposes: No (Academic)
Sensitive: Non-Sensitive
When:DSA runs 2019-01-24 — 2022-01-23
Access method: One-Off
Data-controller type: UNIVERSITY OF ULSTER
Sublicensing allowed: No
Datasets:
- Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey
- Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey (APMS)
Expected Benefits:
The findings from this study, which will be published in academic report format in 2019-2020, will contribute to updating the research evidence base on trends in alcohol use in the English adult (16 years and over, general population), which can be used by to support health and social care efforts to tailor services to target specific groups of drinkers across England deemed to be of greatest risk of alcohol-related harm into the future.
The purpose of the 2014 APMS survey (generally) is to help inform and improve local and national planning for health and support services. The survey series has had a huge impact on our understanding of mental illness, substance dependence and suicidal behaviour, and their causes and consequences. APMS datasets are the only national source of information on rates of untreated mental illness. Advancing on the descriptive analyses published in the 2014 APMS Survey report (McManus et al. 2016), this programme of academic research will provide a detailed evidence as to current levels of harmful, hazardous and dependent drinking in the English adult population aged 16 years and over. It will also provide identify levels of treatment seeking behaviour (both for medication and psychological therapy or counselling) for alcohol-related problems in the general population in 2014. These findings, which will be generated through the analysis of nationally-representative household survey data, will be a robust evidence source for forward planning by policy makers and health care professionals tasked with reducing alcohol-related harm in England.
This research will not directly affect patients, although estimates from the NHS suggest that 9% of men and 3% of women experience alcohol dependence. The findings from this study, which will be published in academic report format in 2019-2020, will contribute to updating the research evidence base on trends in alcohol use in the English adult (16 years and over, general population), which can be used by to support health and social care efforts to tailor services to target specific groups of drinkers across England deemed to be of greatest risk of alcohol-related harm into the future.
Impact will be possible after the publication of research outputs emerging from this body of research circa 2020.
Outputs:
The findings of this programme of research will be written in research report form, and the following papers will be submitted for publication to two academic journals:
1. "Prevalence of hazardous, harmful or dependent drinking in England, 2000, 2007, and 2014: results from the Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey". (to be submitted to JAMA Psychiatry in 2019).
2. "Testing the validity of the alcohol harm paradox in three national surveys: findings from the Alcohol Psychiatric Morbidity Survey" (to be submitted to Addiction in 2020).
No other publications, outputs, presentations or dissemination events are planned for this programme of research.
Publications emerging from this research will be available to key stakeholders responsible for alcohol policy and health service planning.
These two publications are intended for an academic audience and will be accessible to those who have access to the journal subscriptions.
All outputs will only contain data that is aggregated (with small numbers suppressed), in line with NHS Digital guidelines.
APMS low numbers and suppression:
In order to protect patient confidentiality in publications resulting from analysis of APMS data users must:
· guarantee that any outputs made available to anyone other than those with whom this agreement is made, will meet required standards, including the guarantee, methods and standards contained in the Code of Practice for Official Statistics (http://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/assessment/code-of-practice/index.html) and the ONS Statistical Disclosure Control (https://gss.civilservice.gov.uk/statistics/methodology-2/statistical-disclosure-control/) for tables produced from surveys;
· apply methods and standards specified in the Microdata Handling and Security Guide to Good Practice (http://www.data-archive.ac.uk/media/132701/UKDA171-SS-MicrodataHandling.pdf) for disclosure control for statistical outputs.
Processing:
There will be no transfer of data between institutions or organisations. All data will be processed at Ulster University. Only substantive employees of Ulster University will access and process the data. The researcher will log in securely to the UK Data Service to access and download the APMS 2014 dataset and associated documents once the necessary permissions have been granted. The APMS 2014 data will not be accessed or processed outside of the UK.
The data NHS Digital supplies (i.e. the 2014 APMS data) will be analysed carefully, as follows:
1. The original 2014 APMS dataset received from NHS Digital via the UK Data Service will be securely archived on Ulster University's internal data servers. Weekly back-ups of the original file will occur.
2. Only the variables required for the analysis in this programme of work will be copied from the original 2014 APMS dataset into a new SPSS dataset, which will be labelled and saved as a working dataset on an encrypted pen drive. This dataset will be used to prepare all variables for statistical analyses (e.g. cleaning of missing data; re-categorisation of existing variables) and for the conduct of statistical analysis. Only one version of this file will be kept; redundant or obsolete versions of this file will be destroyed.
The variables listed below will be selected from the original archived 2014 APMS dataset for the purposes of analysis.
Outcome variable - AUDIT-SCORE. This variable will be re-categorised as a four-category variable as follows:
1.No/Low risk will be defined as AUDIT scores 0-7
2.Hazardous alcohol use will be defined as AUDIT scores 8-15
3.Harmful drinking/mild or probable dependence will be defined as AUDIT score 16-20
4. Dependence will be defined as AUDIT scores 20+.
The following variables will be selected from the original archived 2014 APMS dataset as explanatory/predictor variables for the respondent:
Age in year bands (16-24; 25-34; 35-44; 45-54; 55-64; 65-74; 75+)
Sex (male vs. female)
Ethnicity (White; Black; Asian; Mixed)
Employment status (Employed; unemployed; economically inactive)
Household composition (1 adult, 1659 no child; 2 adults 1659 no child; Large adult household; 2 adults one or both 60+ no child; 1 adult 60+ no child)
Common mental disorders (CMD) score (count)
Smoking status (smoker in the past year; yes vs. no and number of cigarettes smoked on average a week)
Drug use (drug user in the past year, yes vs. no and use of drug types in the past year)
The 2014 survey will not be linked to any other data source; however, it will be compared - but not linked to the 2000 and 2007 APMS surveys for the purposes of population-level trend analyses. Propensity score analysis will be used to equate the 2014 APMS survey to the 2000 and 2007 APMS on key demographic characteristics namely age, sex, and socio-economic status. Weighted cross-tabulations will be estimated to determine the prevalence of alcohol use and hazardous, harmful and dependent drinking in the total sample and in subgroups. These data will be used to test differences in prevalences between the surveys using 2-sided t tests for independent samples (p < 0.05 will indicate significant differences in the estimates between surveys). Regression models will test the extent to which changes in alcohol use and hazardous, harmful and dependent drinking during 2000-2014 can be explained by period effects (i.e. economic recession), cohort effects, age effects, and the impact of other individual-level factors (i.e. being of lower socio-economic status, having co-occurring mental health problems, smoking and other drug use).
For this programme of research, the 2014 APMS data NHS Digital supplies will be analysed in conjunction with the 2000 and 2007 APMS survey datasets, which are available to bona fide researchers from the UK Data service (https://www.ukdataservice.ac.uk/). No data linkage between the 2000 and 2007 APMS surveys to the 2014 APMS will be conducted. Comparative analysis will be conducted between the three APMS surveys to examine trends in alcohol use and associated harm across this 14-year period. Propensity score analysis will be used to equate the APMS surveys on key demographic characteristics (i.e. age, sex, and socio-economic status). Data involved in this programme of research - that is the three APMS survey series conducted in 2000, 2007, 2014 - are required to examine trends in alcohol use over time. As detailed above, the APMS survey series used comparable measurements of alcohol use and associated harm, which neatly facilitates exploration of trends in the prevalence and correlates of these health behaviours at a population level over time.
No data will be linked to record individual-level data requested from NHS Digital (in this instance, the 2014 APMS survey data). There will be no requirement and no attempt to re-identify individuals.
All organisations party to this agreement must comply with the Data Sharing Framework Contract requirements, including those regarding the use (and purposes of that use) by Personnel (as defined within the Data Sharing Framework Contract ie: employees, agents and contractors of the Data Recipient who may have access to that data).