Guidance on using Feasibility Self-Service

Look out for an email from Data Applications.

The subject of the email will be: NHS DigiTrials Feasibility Self-Service Tool DARS-NIC-652726-K9S4D DAE User Account Created:

The email will provide information about activating your DAE account.

Open Data Access Environment.

Log in with your username and password.

When prompted, enter the authentication code you have been sent.

Note: you will have chosen your preference for receiving this when you set up your DAE account).

You will be asked to log in to DAE twice - this is normal. Please log in with the same username and password each time.

In the box labelled 'Agreement', select your Agreement Number from the drop-down options. You will have received this in the welcome email you received as part of onboarding. Then click 'submit'.

This is the tool you use to access Feasibility Self-Service.

Our welcome page provides information about Feasibility Self-Service. You will see a diagram explaining where we get our data from, and more information about the data and codes used within the service.

Clicking on the ‘Start Search’ button will take you directly to the Search Page where you can run your query.

Our search page is where you can run queries to evaluate the feasibility of your study.

Our search is broken down into a 5 step process:

1. Demographic Criteria (Age range, Gender, Ethnicity, Region and GP Practice) 
2. Clinical Inclusions – Diagnoses and Procedures 
3. Clinical Inclusions – Medication 
4. Clinical Exclusions – Diagnoses and Procedures 
5. Clinical Exclusions – Medication 

The guidance on this page covers some of the functionality on the Search Page in more detail.

All filters are optional and you can use as many as you like.

If you click the ‘More info’ links a pop-up box will appear.

The box contains metadata and offers further detail on the fields within each section of the search page.

Find out more about the codes by typing into your browser the links listed in the Clinical Exclusions section.

DAE restrictions mean you won’t be able to click directly on the links on the Search Page.

If you don’t want to type in the links, you can access them using these links:

ICD10 codes
OPCS codes
BNF codes

You choose which information to filter in or out of your query.

Hospital Diagnoses and Procedures
If you choose to complete both of the diagnoses and procedure sections, your results will return:

• people who have had those diagnoses
• people who have had those procedure
• people who have had both those diagnoses and procedures

Medication

This section can be completed on its own, but it can also be used with a diagnoses and procedures search to locate people in this cohort taking particular medication, or it can be used on its own to include patients who are taking specific medication from your query.

Hospital Diagnoses and Procedures
If you choose to complete both the diagnoses and procedure sections, your results will not return:

• people who have had those diagnoses
• people who have had those procedure
• people who have had both those diagnoses and procedures

Medication

This section can be completed alongside the diagnosis and procedures search to further refine your results or it can be used on its own to simply exclude patients who are taking specific medication from your query.

The ‘Reset buttons are under the ‘More info’ links.

Clicking on ‘Reset’ will clear the information inputted within each section of the Search Page. It will also reset the ‘Yes/No’ button selections.

If you want to select more than one code within a certain filter.

∙ select the first code you want (A02 in our example).

∙ hold down SHIFT on your keyboard and then click the last code you want to select (A18 in our example). This will then select all codes between the two.

∙ click on ‘Apply’ - this will add the codes to your query.

You can repeat this as many times as you like.

After entering all your criteria in the search page you will need to click the ‘Continue’ button:

Once you are happy with the criteria selected, click the ‘Accept and run query’ button.

When the query has completed, you will automatically be taken to the results page.

Please note: it may take up to 5 minutes to return your results. 

This displays the data in columns and rows. The table is interactive, and you can choose what data is displayed in the table.

To change the data that is displayed in the columns and rows, use the drop-downs on the top-right hand side.

Columns can be changed from Integrated Care Board (ICB) to either Region, GP Practice or Deprivation Decile. 

Rows can be changed from Age to Ethnicity, Gender or Deprivation Decile.

Please note: To help protect the identity of patients, suppression has been applied to small numbers. This means that any count below 8 is set to * and any count 8 and above is rounded to the nearest increment of 5. Additionally, if the total of the entire table is less than 100 the table will not display. Small GP Practices (less than 2,500 registered patients) have been grouped into an ‘Unknown’ category to help prevent identification of patients.

The map shows where the greatest number of potential trial participants are located. The larger the dot, the higher the number of patients in that location.

The Search Parameters page can be reached from the results page.

It shows which criteria is currently filtering the results displayed on the Results Page.

The criteria are broken down into ‘Demographic filters’, ‘Clinical Inclusions’ and ‘Clinical Exclusions’ so that you can view each section individually.

∙ On the results page click the ‘Download’ button at the top-right of the Feasibility Self-Service screen.

∙ Select ‘Crosstab’ from the pop-up box.

∙ Select the either the ‘Map Results’ or ‘Table Results’ tab.

∙ Select the ‘CSV’ option to get your results in a .csv file.

∙ Click the ‘Download’ button.

You must access the AWS Management Console. Log in with your DAE username and password.

In the AWS screen, click on ‘All services’ from the 'Services' drop-down, and then click on ‘View all services’.

Open the folder called: nhsd-dspp-dae-prod-data-out. You can dismiss the notice about ‘insufficient permissions.

Select the file you want to download by clicking on it from the list.

Click the ‘Download’ button at the top of the page to download your results.

Please note: This folder is a list of all the exports you’ve made. By default, files are named as “export(x)” with the highest number being the most recent export.