British Columbia Linked Health Database (BCLHD)
Description
The BCLHD is a linked database that collects and maintains provincial health data for the British Columbia Centre for Health Services and Policy Research, which is responsible for extracting and providing data to health researchers. The BCLHD, begun in 1988, is housed at the University of British Columbia and is a source of information on drug utilization, cost issues, drug etiology, and a host of useful long-term data on physician claims, vital statistics, pharmacy care data, and hospital data. Health information on more than four million residents is included in the BCLHD and is one of the few databases worldwide that has longitudinal health information on an entire population. Access to the BCLHD is through application to the Ministry of Health; costs are based on the complexity of cohort definition, the number of data files and the number of years of data requested.
Selected References
Population Burden
Brackley ME, Penning MJ, Lesperance ML.
In the absence of cancer registry data, is it sensible to assess incidence using hospital separation records?
Int J Equity Health 2006 Oct 6;5:12.
Chamberlayne R, Green B, Barer ML, Hertzman C, Lawrence WJ, Sheps SB.
Creating a population-based linked health database: a new resource for health services research.
Can J Public Health 1998 Jul-Aug;89(4):270-3.
Cost/Cost Effectiveness
Morgan SG.
Prescription drug expenditures and population demographics.
Health Serv Res 2006 Apr;41(2):411-28.
Morgan SG, Bassett KL, Wright JM, Evans RG, Barer ML, Caetano PA, Black CD.
"Breakthrough" drugs and growth in expenditure on prescription drugs in Canada.
BMJ 2005 Oct 8;331(7520):815-6.
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