In today’s world, there is no shortage of data. From information derived from our phones and wallets to parliamentary petitions and health records, the existence of data is myriad; but what value do the data have if we cannot contextualise it?
The Geographic Data Service (GeoDS) is proud to announce the launch of the new UK Longitudinal Linkage Collaboration (UK LLC)-linked Access to Healthy Assets and Hazards (AHAH) index.
The collaboration brings together GeoDS’s expertise in geographic data with UK LLC’s secure research infrastructure, creating new opportunities for researchers across disciplines to investigate the relationship between place and health.
Mark Green, GeoDS Investigator and Professor of Health Geography at the University of Liverpool, hopes that the collaboration can “answer new questions not possible elsewhere” by helping researchers “examine the utility of AHAH to the detailed linked datasets in UK LLC covering rich individual level population surveys and linked administrative data”.
The AHAH index is an openly available data product summarising the accessibility (distance) to various health-promoting and health-damaging features of the built environment across Great Britain. The index synthesises accessibility into a single composite score, and comprises four thematic domains:
- Health services: GPs, hospitals, pharmacies, dentists, leisure centres
- Green and blue space: Passive greenspace, active greenspace, blue space
- Air quality: NO₂, PM₁₀, SO₂
- Retail outlets: Fast food outlets, gambling venues, pubs and bars, vape and tobacco retailers
Linking these data from AHAH with data held in the UK LLC Trusted Research Environment (TRE) means researchers can now apply to access the TRE to investigate these relationships in greater depth than before.
Dr Abigail Harrison, Research Manager at UK LLC, says researchers are already using the linked resource to explore a wide range of public health questions.
“Through UK LLC, researchers are already using the AHAH index alongside Longitudinal Population Study data and linked NHS records to investigate how neighbourhood characteristics influence health outcomes,” she says.
Current projects include examining how local environments are associated with physical and mental health by combining AHAH with health records, self-reported wellbeing measures and deprivation data.
Other studies are using the index alongside healthcare records to improve prediction of winter respiratory diseases and identify communities at greater risk of severe illness, while researchers are also investigating whether long-term exposure to air pollution affects the risk of cardiovascular disease and dementia differently depending on an individual’s genetic susceptibility.
Building healthier places through data
Both GeoDS and UK LLC hope the collaboration will have an impact beyond academic research.
“By bringing together place-based data from GeoDS, such as the AHAH index, with Longitudinal Population Study, healthcare and administrative data, UK LLC is enabling researchers to better understand how the environments people live in influence their health and wellbeing,” says Dr Harrison.
She adds that the findings could help inform public health policy, interventions and services, while supporting efforts to reduce health inequalities.
Researchers from geography, public health, epidemiology, data science and many other disciplines are expected to benefit from the dataset. Because UK LLC’s TRE contains data covering a wide range of research areas, the AHAH index can also be used by anyone who wants to understand the role that local environments play in shaping people’s lives.
Previous research has already demonstrated the value of combining the AHAH index with longitudinal data, showing an association between neighbourhood environments and mental health. The new linked dataset will allow future researchers to build on this work and explore how place influences a wider range of health outcomes.
Unlocking the value of data
For Mark, collaborations like this are essential to getting the most from existing data.
“It is about linking up all the existing data services out there to maximise their value. Individually they cannot answer the most pressing societal issues, but together they bring added value.”
Dr Harrison agrees that secure data linkage is key to answering increasingly complex research questions.
“Linking participants’ Longitudinal Population Study data to place-based datasets such as those developed by GeoDS provides a simple, effective and efficient solution where researchers can access richer triangulated data,” she says. “This enables them to explore complex questions about how people, places and health interact over time.”
While combining datasets can present technical challenges, Mark says the partnership with UK LLC made the process straightforward, describing working with the team as “easy and great”. “There was some trade-off in matching more granular geographical information about where people live while minimising disclosure risks. We think we have found a good balance.”
Protecting privacy remains central to the collaboration. As Mark emphasises, “We are talking to the public about how they want their data used and we feed these insights into our work.”
Explore your neighbourhood
Enter your postcode on the top left to zoom to your neighbourhood. Click on the map to view how the neighbourhood scores on the AHAH composite index and across the four domains.
To explore the data in more detail, view the map on GeoDS Mapmaker (opens in a new tab).
