Case identification of non-traumatic brain injury in youth using linked population data
Rebecca F Slykerman1, Betony E Clasby2, Jimmy Chong3
1Department of Psychological Medicine, Te Ara Hāro, University of Auckland, Building 507, 22-30 Park Avenue, Auckland, Grafton, 1023, New Zealand. r.slykerman@auckland.ac.nz.
Background:
Population-level administrative data provides a cost-effective means of monitoring health outcomes and service needs of clinical populations. This study aimed to present a method for case identification of non-traumatic brain injury in population-level data and to examine the association with sociodemographic factors.
Methods:
An estimated resident population of youth aged 0-24 years was constructed using population-level datasets within the New Zealand Integrated Data Infrastructure. A clinical consensus committee reviewed the International Classification of Diseases Ninth and Tenth Editions codes and Read codes for inclusion in a case definition. Cases were those with at least one non-traumatic brain injury code present in the five years up until 30 June 2018 in one of four databases in the Integrated Data Infrastructure. Rates of non-traumatic brain injury were examined, both including and excluding birth injury codes and across age, sex, ethnicity, and socioeconomic deprivation groups.
Results:
Of the 1 579 089 youth aged 0-24 years on 30 June 2018, 8154 (0.52%) were identified as having one of the brain injury codes in the five-years to 30 June 2018. Rates of non-traumatic brain injury were higher in males, children aged 0-4 years, Māori and Pacific young people, and youth living with high levels of social deprivation.
Conclusion:
This study presents a comprehensive method for case identification of non-traumatic brain injury using national population-level administrative data.
