Maternity Services Dataset SNOMED data quality dashboard

This dashboard has been designed to help providers improve their usage of SNOMED and thereby improve the submission of SNOMED to MSDS.

You may find it useful to expand the power BI to full screen mode by using the diagonal arrows on the bottom right of the frame.  

To navigate through the tool, use the contents tab at the bottom of the page. Or use the arrows in the bottom left and right corners of the screen. Each tab contains information on a specific topic or measure.

Select a region, organisation and where applicable month from the options available in each tab to view corresponding data.

SNOMED is a clinical terminology used in electronic health records. SNOMED gives clinical IT systems a single shared language, which makes exchanging information between systems easier, safer and more accurate. It contains all the clinical terms needed for the whole NHS, from procedures and symptoms through to clinical measurements, diagnoses and medications.

Clinicians are advised to use SNOMED in such a way that if another clinician were to review the care notes, enough detail is there to allow that clinician understand the care that has been given.

The dashboard will help providers get a better understanding of SNOMED and how to improve usage. The dashboard assesses how much SNOMED is flowing to MSDS, to which fields and tables, and by which providers. There is also a focus on procedures and assessments.

Data can be filtered by region, provider, most recent system supplier and where appropriate by month.

The main areas covered by the dashboard are:

• which organisations have or have not submitted any SNOMED
• counts of the number of different concepts submitted and values at national and organisational level
• which organisations have submitted any data to the tables and fields in MSDS that accept SNOMED codes
• whether appropriate clinical code hierarchy types have been submitted to tables and fields in MSDS that accept SNOMED codes
• whether invalid codes have been submitted to tables and fields in MSDS that accept SNOMED codes

The Saving Babies Lives care bundle (version 2) provides detailed information for providers and commissioners of maternity care on how to reduce perinatal mortality across England. It brings together this information in five elements of care based on evidence and best practice. It is part of an aim, reiterated in in NHS Long Term Plan, to reduce stillbirth, maternal mortality, neonatal mortality and serious brain injury by 50% by 2025, as well as a reduction in preterm birth rate from 8% to 6%.

The five elements are:

• reducing smoking in pregnancy
• risk assessment, prevention and surveillance of pregnancies at risk of fetal growth restriction (FGR)
• raising awareness of reduced fetal movement (RFM)
• effective fetal monitoring during labour
• reducing preterm birth

The “Saving Babies Lives – Codes Submitted” page of the dashboard identifies clinical codes relating to these five elements submitted to the Maternity Services Data Set. It provides information on the counts of the number of different concepts submitted and values at national and organisational level.

The report cannot tell you an exact list of which SNOMED concepts we expect to see submitted to MSDS. 

It cannot tell you if every SNOMED concept submitted by an organisation is appropriate, as there is such a wide range on the SNOMED concepts that can be used as part of clinical care. We will not be able to assess all the individual SNOMED codes that flow to MSDS.

As a secondary uses data set MSDS re-uses clinical and operational data for purposes other than direct patient care. It defines the data items, definitions and associated value sets extracted or derived from local information systems and sent to NHS Digital for analysis purposes.

MSDS sets out national definitions for the extraction of data including:  

• mother’s details
• mother’s booking, pregnancy and diagnosis details
• care contacts and activities
• mother’s labour and activity details
• anonymous assessments and findings
• baby’s details
• hospital provider spells (inpatient stays in hospital during the pregnancy)
• header and reference data. 

MSDS v2.0 is an update to the data set that introduces a new structure and content, including clinical terminology. It also mandates the submission of all maternity records in scope of the data set, including records that are held on paper which must be submitted in the required electronic format.

Find out more information about MSDS.

Questions and feedback should be sent to [email protected].