Objective 3: Health Care Data Resource Plan

The assessment will develop a structured inventory of data resources used in Objectives 1 and 2 and additional datasets identified for health care planning and Certificate of Need reviews. For each dataset, the assessment will examine:

• Location of data repositories
• Data content and key variables
• Inclusion of supporting materials such as data dictionaries, schemas, and definitions
• Geographic and population coverage
• Frequency and timeliness of data collection and methods used to collect the data
• Access requirements, including data governance, ownership, stewardship and cost where applicable
• Data quality and known limitations or constraints on use of the data

This work will help identify where existing data resources support planning needs and where additional data collection or access may be necessary.

For the purposes of this assessment, data will be grouped based on their primary function in health planning. These categories are intended to organize the data landscape and will be refined as the work progresses.

The assessment will examine:

• Utilization and claims data, which describe how services are used across settings and payers
• Clinical and encounter-level data, which provide insight into care delivery and outcomes
• Facility, provider, and system capacity data, which describe the structure and organization of the health care system
• Financial and cost data, which support analysis of cost, revenue, and financial sustainability, including charity care
• Workforce data, which describes the supply and distribution of health care providers, and attribution of providers to places of practice and patients
• Public health and population health data, which provide information on health status, risk factors, disparities, and health care needs
• Social determinants of health data, which describe non-medical factors influencing health and access to care
• Social needs and social services data, which describe non-medical needs and use of social supports
• Regional and local data systems data, which provide more detailed or localized insights and are not available statewide
• Health information exchange and data infrastructure, current infrastructure in the state that promotes health information exchange and future enhancements

The assessment will consider how each category contributes to planning and where there may be gaps in coverage, consistency, transparency, or usability.

Many data elements relevant to health planning are available from multiple data sources across different agencies and organizations. While this can support validation and cross-checking, it may also create duplication, inconsistency, and increased reporting burden.

The assessment will:

• Identify data elements that are collected by multiple state entities or organizations
• Describe data availability across entities and organizations
• Evaluate differences in definitions, level of detail, and timeliness
• Assess whether duplication enhances data quality or creates inefficiencies
• Identify other data sources from federal, tribal, or local government entities, or the private sector that fulfill the same data need

This work will help identify opportunities to better align data collection and reduce unnecessary duplication.

Health care entities are subject to a wide range of reporting requirements across state, federal, and private authorities. These requirements may overlap, use inconsistent definitions, or require submission to multiple entities.

The assessment will:

• Identify and categorize reporting requirements for health care entities across agencies and programs
• Evaluate the administrative and operational burden associated with reporting
• Assess the extent to which reporting requirements are duplicative or fragmented
• Examine whether existing reporting requirements continue to support planning and policy needs, noting where the reporting requirements are statutory

The assessment will also evaluate opportunities to:

• Align reporting requirements across agencies
• Reduce duplication by leveraging existing datasets, including federal data sources
• Modernize and streamline reporting processes
• Explore health data utility models to achieve reporting requirements and streamline data access

Health care data in Washington is collected and maintained by multiple agencies and entities, often with differing definitions of data ownership, stewardship, and access requirements.

The assessment will examine:

• How data ownership and stewardship are currently defined and applied across data sources
• How Tribal Data Sovereignty is applied across public health and health care data systems
• State agency roles and responsibilities related to data collection, maintenance, and usability including data integrity and accuracy
• Opportunities to improve consistency and coordination across agencies

The assessment will also consider governance issues related to:

• Expectations for data vendors, including documentation, usability, and transparency
• The extent to which current governance structures support effective data use for health care planning
• Guidelines around data privacy and security
• Perspectives on data ownership and data stewardship including considerations of power sharing, data sovereignty, and data democratization

The assessment will evaluate data needs identified in earlier objectives against existing data resources to identify gaps. Each data element will be assessed based on:

• Availability
• Accessibility
• Timeliness
• Quality
• Consistency

In addition to identifying gaps in availability, the assessment will evaluate how data is used once collected. This includes examining whether data is:

• Aggregated and integrated across sources
• Subject to quality control
• Regularly analyzed
• Used to inform planning, policy, and CoN decision-making
• Able to be used for multiple purposes

This work will help identify datasets that may be underutilized and opportunities to better align data collection with its intended use.

While Washington collects substantial health care data, statutory and regulatory provisions may limit the ability to fully use that data for planning and CoN activities.

The assessment will examine:

• Restrictions on data linkage across datasets
• Jurisdictional or other geographic or classification-based restrictions on data access
• Limitations on access to record-level data or to data deemed proprietary
• Constraints on data sharing across agencies
• Administrative requirements that affect the timeliness and feasibility of data access
• Costs and administrative processes to request data access
• Timeliness of fulfilling data requests
• Methods for accessing data systems

The analysis will consider how these factors affect the ability to conduct comprehensive and timely health planning, while recognizing the need for appropriate privacy and security protections.

The assessment will also evaluate approaches to balancing access, privacy, and data quality:

• Tiered data access
• Privacy-preserving linkage methods
• Standardized data use agreements, including umbrella agreements

The ability to effectively use health care data depends on the systems used to store, transfer, link, and analyze data.

The assessment will evaluate:

• Current state-based data infrastructure capabilities across agencies including both on-site and cloud-based services
• The ability to aggregate and integrate data across state data sources
• Tools and environments available for analysis by data users including local and tribal authorities
• Capacity to support data analysis, research, and evaluation
• Capacity to support online public reporting and public use files

This work will consider the role of developing systems such as the Washington Health Data Exchange (WAHDX) in improving data availability, timeliness, and coordination.

The assessment will explore opportunities to improve transparency and public access to data used in health planning. This includes evaluating:

• Public-facing data products and dashboards
• Local data used in CoN review processes
• Approaches to increasing community engagement in the planning process