[MA 2023 21] SHOWCASE Leren van Data: Will you help us learn from big data in nursing homes across the country?

Department of Medicine for Older People at Amsterdam UMC
Proposed by: Dr. Karlijn Joling [k.joling@amsterdamumc.nl]

What is the topic?

In nursing homes a lot of data is recorded during the care process. However, these data are not yet used optimally for continuity of care, quality improvement, scientific research and policy. Within the Leren van Data research line, we aim to improve this with an enthusiastic team of researchers and PhD students.

We have access to pseudonymized information from the electronic health record (EHR) Ysis and the electronic prescription system Medimo about the daily care and treatment of clients in nursing homes. The EHR Ysis is used by nearly half of the Dutch nursing homes (>61K clients) and contains, for example, the medical history, the treatment policy and the use of involuntary care.

Furthermore, over 20 nursing homes participate as 'Peilstation' and register additional data each year to gain insight into the management of (suspected) urinary tract infections and lower respiratory tract infections and the use of psychotropic drugs. Peilstations receive annual feedback based on their own performance data compared to guidelines and other nursing homes during a group feedback session in order to learn and improve their quality of care.

Besides, there is access to data, collected through the EHR Ysis, from the start of the COVID-19 pandemic to monitor within nursing homes the course and severity of COVID-19 (and more recently, influenza).

Possible research questions for all these data focus, for example, on reported diseases, the prescribed medication and adherence to guidelines, registration behavior of practitioners and the use of data for continuous learning and quality improvement.

What will you be doing?

Depending on the research question, activities will involve data cleaning, analysis and reporting your findings. Furthermore, literature research will be necessary to interpret your findings. In addition to quantitative research on existing data, we also offer the opportunity to conduct qualitative research with us and/or collect (additional) data yourself.

Do you have your own research idea? We can't wait to learn more from you!

Who are we?

Leren van Data is one of the research lines of the Department of Medicine for Older People at Amsterdam UMC. We are a diverse group of researchers with various backgrounds including medicine, nursing, epidemiology, and the movement and health sciences. For more information, explore our work at unoamsterdam.nl/lerenvandata.

The Department of Medicine for Older People is located in the OZW-building on the VU campus.

Next to our research activities, the department also provides the specialist training of Elderly Care Physicians (Specialist Ouderengeneeskunde), courses in the medical curriculum, and postgraduate education programs for healthcare professionals in long-term care.

Support?

Based on the chosen topic, you will be assigned a daily supervisor within the team and you will be part of our multidisciplinary research team. At our department weekly research meetings are organized specifically for and by our research interns. In these meetings you will learn more about the other research projects of our department, different study designs in long-term care and offer a valuable opportunity to receive feedback on your own research project.

Interested or want more information?

Mail to dr. Karlijn Joling, k.joling@amsterdamumc.nl, Principal Investigator Leren van data. Don't forget to mention your intended internship period in the email. Emails in Dutch are no problem.