The ECHILD research database joins together existing de-identified health, education and social care information for all children in England.

https://www.echild.ac.uk/

Key features

• Population-based longitudinal cohort of children & young people in England born since 01/09/1984 (~20M individuals)
• NHS Hospital Episode Statistics administrative datasets
• DfE National Pupil Database, including the Children Looked After Return and Children in Need Census
• ONS Mortality and Birth Registration

Education & Child Health Insights from Linked Data (ECHILD) is a deidentified longitudinal population-based cohort of children & young people in England born between 01/09/1984.

In England, information on a child’s journey through education and social care is recorded in administrative records held by the Department for Education (the National Pupil Database; NPD). NHS holds information about all NHS hospital contacts (captured in Hospital Episode Statistics; HES). HES records are generated for the purposes of service delivery, e.g., to support financial reimbursement for treatment relating to a hospital stay.

Within ECHILD, healthcare, education and social care records have been linked to create a longitudinal database that follows children over time. The database is very useful for research as health, education and social care trajectories are strongly interrelated from childhood to adulthood. ECHILD provides a valuable opportunity to explore these relationships and to generate evidence for policy and practice.

ECHILD will only be used for research that has a clear public benefit in England and Wales to improve the health and well-being of children and young people accessing health, education and social care services. The specific research purposes (permitted uses) are below with examples of relevant research questions.

• Informing preventative strategies by Healthcare and Education services e.g., do disabled children attending schools, or living in areas that provide a good level of disability support in school or through social care services, have lower rates of unplanned hospital contacts compared with less supportive schools/areas?
• Informing children and their parents e.g., about variation in special educational needs support and outcomes for children with chronic health conditions or disability.
• Informing education and clinical practice e.g., investigating whether associations between chronic health conditions and lower school attainment are explained by school absence.
• Identifying groups who could benefit from intervention e.g., what are the health outcomes of children post age 16 who have contact with social care services or have special educational needs?
• Understanding the most effective methods for working with linked health and education data e.g., what are the most effective methods for working with linked health and education data?

ECHILD data are deidentified and further data linkage is not permitted. Data can only be accessed by approved researchers in the ONS SRS, and researchers are not permitted to try to re-identify individuals. Furthermore, any results of analyses (tables or figures) are checked by ONS staff for potential disclosure risk before they can be exported from the ONS SRS.

To access ECHILD, the following steps are required:

• Contact ECHILD Team: ich.echild@ucl.ac.uk
• Complete ethics self-assessment
• Submit an application form to UCL
• Obtain approval from UCL on feasibility and purpose
• Submit the UCL-approved application form to the ONS Research Accreditation Panel (RAP)
• Obtain approval from RAP for release under Digital Economy Act (DEA)
• Sign Data Access Agreements with UCL & ONS Accredited Researcher Assurance Registration (ARAR) form.
• UCL instructs ONS to provide access to a specified extract of ECHILD to named user(s)