Summary of consultation feedback on the draft strategy
The draft National Sports Injury Data Strategy was released on the AIHW Sports Injury web page on 18 February 2022. (AIHW 2023). Broad consultation on the draft strategy was sought to ensure the strategy can deliver data that benefits individuals, sport organisations and researchers. A consultation report summarising the feedback is published on the AIHW website.
Key themes from submissions highlighted:
- A high level of support for the strategy
- The need to leverage existing data sources through standardised reporting and improved access.
- Data gaps and varying data quality.
Enablers for the strategy included:
- Data sharing standards
- Alignment with the proposed National Injury Prevention Strategy 2021-2031 (Department of Health, 2020)
- Leadership by a national agency (AIHW).
Barriers to effective implementation of the strategy included:
- Issues regarding privacy, consent, and access
- Lack of systematic data collection
- Governance and resourcing.
Consultation suggested further work to:
- refine governance, privacy, consent, security and access arrangements and provide education around recommended best practice
- consider resourcing requirements for data collection
- standardise data collection and reporting, to improve data quality and reduce data gaps
- explore incorporating standardised core sports injury items into existing platforms (such as medical, sports trainer, sports administration/registration, sports insurer and education incident management platforms)
- work with stakeholders to ensure that data is provided on platforms and in ways that is easy to access and understand
- work with stakeholders and data providers to minimise risks that data would be used out-of-context or frame a sport as ‘dangerous’.