Headaches are common and often do not require hospitalisation. However, headaches account for 1–4% of all emergency department visits and here, headaches are one of the most challenging complaints to assess. Potentially life-threatening causes are rare and imaging using CT or MRI is usually not indicated. However, neuro-imaging remains the most common investigation, especially in older adults, where concerns about intracranial pathologies are highest. Pathways to stratify neuro-imaging and admission would be helpful.

This dataset includes 5,352 patients aged 65 and over who presented with headaches. It contains detailed data on demographics, vital signs (e.g., blood pressure, respiratory rate, heart rate, temperature, NEWS2 score, BMI), comorbidities, assessments, lab results, medical events, medications (including dose and route), imaging (films and reports), onward referrals, treatments (including surgery), mortality, and readmissions (short- and long-term). Data spans from 2013 to 2023. While this subset focuses on older adults, a full dataset covering all ages is also available.

Geography: The West Midlands has a population of 6 million & includes a diverse ethnic & socio-economic mix. UHB is one of the largest NHS Trusts in England, providing direct acute services & specialist care across four hospital sites, with 2.2 million patient episodes per year, 2750 beds & > 120 ITU bed capacity. UHB runs a fully electronic healthcare record (PICS; Birmingham Systems), a shared primary & secondary care record (Your Care Connected) & a patient portal “My Health”.

Data set availability: Data access is available via the PIONEER Hub for projects which will benefit the public or patients. This can be by developing a new understanding of disease, by providing insights into how to improve care, or by developing new models, tools, treatments, or care processes. Data access can be provided to NHS, academic, commercial, policy and third sector organisations. Applications from SMEs are welcome. There is a single data access process, with public oversight provided by our public review committee, the Data Trust Committee. Contact pioneer@uhb.nhs.uk or visit www.pioneerdatahub.co.uk for more details.

Available supplementary data: Matched controls; ambulance and community data. Unstructured data (images). We can provide the dataset in OMOP and other common data models and can build synthetic data to meet bespoke requirements.

Available supplementary support: Analytics, model build, validation & refinement; A.I. support. Data partner support for ETL (extract, transform & load) processes. Bespoke and “off the shelf” Trusted Research Environment build and run. Consultancy with clinical, patient & end-user and purchaser access/ support. Support for regulatory requirements. Cohort discovery. Data-driven trials and “fast screen” services to assess population size.