New directorship of IPDLN for 2019 and 2020

Congratulations to Australia’s Population Health Research Network (PHRN) and South Australia Northern Territory DataLink (SA NT DataLink) who will take on the directorship of the IPDLN for 2019 and 2020. Dr. Merran Smith, chief executive of the PHRN, will be the IPDLN director for this term. The 2020 IPDLN conference will be held in Adelaide, Australia.

2018 conference proceedings now published

The proceedings from the 2018 IPDLN Conference which was held in Banff, Alberta, Canada from September 12 to 14, 2018 are now published in the International Journal of Population Data Science. Abstracts, which include a broad range of topics from public engagement to artificial intelligence, from 520 delegates worldwide are presented.

About the Network

Every two years, directorship of the Network moves sites. The Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES) and the O’Brien Institute for Public Health have assumed co-directorship for 2017-2018.

Interim Executive Team 2017-18

What is data linkage?

Secondary use of linked administrative data is often referred to as ‘data linkage,’ ‘record linkage,’ or ‘linked data.’  This is typically population based longitudinal data that has originally been collected for another purpose.  Linkage may take place across data sets in a single domain (i.e. health) or across domains (i.e. health, education, environment, early childhood, etc.) 

Why is it important?

Data linkage is an invaluable tool for population health research. It provides a completely unbiased picture of the entire population, is cost-effective relative to other data collection mechanisms, and enables studies to be done that could not otherwise be performed.

The Network role

The International Population Data Linkage Network (IPDLN) facilitates communication between centres that specialize in data linkage and users of the linked data. The producers and users alike are committed to the systematic application of data linkage to produce community benefit in the population and health-related domains.

Over 30 participants from Canada, the UK, Australia and New Zealand attended the 2008 inaugural meeting of the IPDLN (then known as the IHDLN), held in London, UK and hosted by the Research and Development Directorate of the National Health Service. The IPDLN now boasts over 400 members.