Data source: BC Ministry of Health
Date range
2012/2013 onward
Note: the MoH's Access to Health Data for Research policy may be found here
Description
The National Ambulatory Care Reporting System (NACRS) is a tool for collecting data and reporting on all levels of ambulatory care within Canada including emergency departments (EDs), day surgery, and medical and surgical day clinics within hospitals, the community and private clinics. NACRS facilitates comparisons and benchmarking across jurisdictions provincially and nationally through the use of standardized definitions and coding standards that adhere to national and international standards.
In September 2010 the BC Ministry of Health (the Ministry) mandated the health authorities to work with Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) to implement the NACRS Level 2 at fifteen high volume emergency departments across the province. NACRS Level 2 will provide patient level, demographic and wait time information and clinical data including presenting complaint and discharge diagnosis. Presently there are a total of thirty hospital EDs in the province reporting to NACRS and no ambulatory care facility is reporting in BC.
- Variables available
Both Core and Non-Core fields are available for this data set.
Core vs. Non-Core Data
- Core Data: Some BC Ministry of Health data sets available through PopData and HDPBC are called ‘Core Data’. A Core Data set is a standardized ‘bundle’ of commonly requested variables. A Core Data set may not include ALL the variables available in the data set. For example, some Core Data variables, such as geography or organisational codes, are suppressed to meet privacy legislation requirements.
- Non-Core Data: Non-Core Data are variables that are NOT included in the standardized Core Data set. Non-Core Data is available for request as an addition to the Core Data set.
For the majority of DARs, requesting access to Core Data ONLY may make the data access approval process quicker and may expedite data provision. Data requests that include Non-Core Data will be subject to regular rather than expedited processes, both for application review and data provisioning.
Please note that the overall data access request is subject to meeting ALL of the Five SAFEs requirements. For more detail on the Five SAFEs, visit the Eligibility and the Five SAFES model page of our website.
> download NACRS all available variables (pdf)
- Data update schedule
For BC, our NACRS data usually has a 3-month lag.
Approximate data update schedule Complete data up to: January September 30th April December 31st July March 31st October June 30th
Please note: Our data update schedule depends on when these data are made available to us by the data provider, so the update schedule is an estimation only.
- Inclusions
By the end of 2013/14, twenty nine facilities were submitting data on emergency visits to NACRS. Details of which facilities are reporting to NACRS
- Exclusions
By the end of 2013/14, twenty nine facilities were submitting data on emergency visits to NACRS. Details of which facilities are reporting to NACRS
- Data changes over time
2012/13 – Twenty facilities were submitting data on emergency visits to NACRS
By the end of 2013/14, twenty nine facilities were submitting data on emergency visits to NACRS. Details of which facilities are reporting to NACRS
2014/15 - The CDU flag and in/out times became mandatory reporting on April 1, 2014.
- Quality/accuracy of information/field coding source
The centralized data processing of the NACRS records, done by the Canadian Institute of Health Information (CIHI), results in increased efficiency and standardization among the participating provinces. For more information, go to: https://www.cihi.ca/en/national-ambulatory-care-reporting-system-nacrs-metadata.
Since not all EDs in BC report to NACRS, information from NACRS can be combined with records in the physician fee-for-service data (MSP) to capture the majority of ED visits, see: Methods to comprehensively identify emergency department visits using administrative data in British Columbia.
