ICMR launches NDQF to improve quality of health and demographic data in India

The ICMR's National Institute for Medical Statistics and the Population Council have launched The National Data Quality Forum (NDQF) to generate meaningful dialogue around the improvement of data quality in general, and for health and medical research in particular.

The NDQF will integrate learnings from scientific and evidence-based initiatives and guide actions through periodic workshops and conferences, a statement by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) said.

Its activities will gear towards establishing protocols and good practices for data collection, storage, use and dissemination which can be applied to health and demographic data, as well as replicated across industries and sectors, the statement said.

India has a rich resource of data on its population, its health status and demographic behaviour, and economic condition, among many other aspects of life and environment, the statement stated.

This wealth of data is translated into insights and, eventually, into policy through a layered process involving human and technological inputs at every stage. However, these data often suffer from some common challenges related to human and technological factors that affect its quality.

While in the recent years, data quality improvement efforts have been undertaken in both the public and private sectors at independent institution levels, a convergence of these efforts is yet to be achieved in the form of an integrated platform at the national level that can guide data quality improvement efforts in a cohesive manner, it said.

"With a renewed emphasis on improving the quality of data that feeds into evidence based decision making at different levels, the NDQF hopes to bring together relevant stakeholders, subject matter experts, industry leaders, decision makers, and data scientists/analysts onto a common platform," Dr Balram Bhargava, Director General of ICMR, said.

"This platform will be guided by the direction provided by a high level steering committee and operationalised with the help of a technical advisory group composed of subject matter experts with a mandate to create a dialogue for data quality, and build a like-minded community of practice," he said.

"We are delighted to launch the National Data Quality Forum and embark upon a fruitful collaboration to generate meaningful dialogue around the improvement of data quality in general, and for health and medical research in particular," Dr Bhargava added.