The sources of information used by National Oesophago-Gastric Cancer Audit are described in the data flow diagram. In summary, the audit receives a core set of information from NHS acute trusts in England and the Welsh Cancer Network. This information is then supplemented with information from other national datasets. For England, these datasets are typically provided by NHS Digital. For Wales, the datasets are provided by NHS Wales Health Collaborative.
The Clinical Effectiveness Unit (CEU) of the Royal College of Surgeons of England (RCS), where the NOGCA project team is based, acts as a data processor for the audit. The data controller for the audit is Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership (HQIP).
The Clinical Effectiveness Unit does not receive sensitive patient identifiers. The multiple datasets received by the audit include unique but anonymous identifiers, used for the sole purposes of linking the separate datasets received – to conduct the audit’s analyses. All reporting of the analysis findings is on anonymised aggregated information; for example by English NHS Trusts and Welsh Health Board.