Patient journey modelling – from data to insights into patient pathways

Opportunity

Improve understanding of how people access health services in NSW in order to identify the best care pathways for patients.

Project objective

This project will deliver evidence-based information regarding ”what happens next” for patients in the NSW Health system. The research team will develop a framework to analyse what happens to patients following a GP or hospital emergency room visit, capturing all possible pathways a patient can take through the health system.

Making use of the NSW government’s Lumos program – a data linkage initiative which combines consumer data from participating General Practices with data from hospitals and other health settings – the project will use this powerful data pool to build algorithms that map patient journeys and build predictive tools.

This work will allow researchers to address nuanced questions about different patient cohorts across NSW. It will also allow them to look at typical patient journeys across demographics, and what their outcomes are statistically more likely to be. The team hope to show the crucial transition points during these journeys, highlight what drives those transition points, and show where people shift to a different trajectory.