Register your project for Clinical Record Interactive Search (CRIS)
What is CRIS?
Clinical Record Interactive Search (CRIS) provides a means of analysing de-identified data from the Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust (OHFT) electronic patient records. CRIS (powered by Akrivia Health), unlocks and transforms clinical data held in Trust systems to provide a rich and pseudonymised resource allowing researchers and clinicians to investigate hypotheses and identify patient cohorts. CRIS also provides an invaluable tool for service evaluation and clinical audit.
Access to clinical information is clearly a sensitive issue and a security model was developed which has been considered and approved by the Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust Caldicott Guardian and the Trust Executive.
Clinical Records
Trust Electronic Patient Record (EPR) systems hold a wealth of useful patient data. CRIS transforms this information into a pseudonymised database appropriate for research, service evaluation and clinical audit use.
Data Transformation
The transformation of data enables CRIS users to access the wealth of information recorded during patient care by healthcare professionals. This includes data recorded in coded and structured form, for example dates and numbers, plus data held in unstructured free text form, for example, within written assessments, progress notes and correspondence. After transformation, free text data can constitute a large part of the content of information held within CRIS, although this will depend on the amount of unstructured data held in the source EPR system.
The transformation process uses the patient’s EPR system identifier to derive a unique ID for each patient in the database. This ID does not allow CRIS users to identify patients. However, where patients have given appropriate consent, the ID can be used by authorised personnel to contact patients who have been identified as potential recruits to an ethics approved research project.
How can I access CRIS?
Access to CRIS requires either an NHS contract or a Research Passport.
If you have an NHS contract that is not with Oxford Health please contact the HR department within your own Trust and ask them to prepare an NHS to NHS Proforma.
Requests for access to CRIS should be emailed to cris.admin@oxfordhealth.nhs.uk Users are required to agree to the UK CRIS Terms and Conditions prior to being granted access to CRIS.
Once your right to access CRIS has been approved you can register your CRIS project.
Registering a CRIS Project
To register your CRIS research project please download the research registration form and email your completed application to cris.admin@oxfordhealth.nhs.uk. A member of the CRIS team will then contact you to establish the feasibility of your CRIS question. To assist you in determining your approach to interrogating the data we have produced a sample data plan which can be found here.
For a service evaluation or clinical audit, please visit the Trust Clinical Audit pages to download the relevant application form. To determine whether your project is Research, Service Evaluation or Clinical Audit please click here.
Additional information regarding the suggested content for the ‘Summary, Research and Scientific Justification’ fields, please see here for further information.
Once your project has passed feasibility your project will be formally registered on the CRIS system by a member of the CRIS team. Your project will then be submitted to the CRIS Oversight Group to seek their approval.
Access to the CRIS Secure Environment – Amazon Web Service (AWS)
Access to the CRIS facility is via a secure private network on a research platform with AWS. Once your right to access CRIS has been approved the CRIS Admin team will set up your AWS user account. This will enable you to apply for a CRIS user account, access to the CRIS facility along with statistical analysis software and your project files.
Creating a CRIS User account
In addition to a AWS user account, see above, a CRIS user account will also be required by all project lead CRIS researchers. This will enable the formal registration of your CRIS project to the CRIS system.
To obtain a CRIS user account, log on to AWS and access CRIS via the UK-CRIS desktop icon. From the CRIS home screen select ‘Register’ to submit a user application, which will be approved by a member of the CRIS Admin team. The CRIS Admin team will register your CRIS project once it has passed feasibility and you will automatically be added as a project user.
Security Requirements of CRIS use
CRIS can only be accessed from within a secure workspace and cannot be saved on personal or encrypted USB sticks. Please be aware that additional permission is required for derived data to be analysed outside of the secure workspace.
The security model includes regular audits of searches carried out using CRIS (all searches by all users are recorded and can be audited). For this to be possible, we keep a record of all projects carried out involving CRIS analysis along with general specification of the type of searches which will be required.
Ethics and research governance approval assume anonymity of the data analysed. As with any dataset, there is the potential within this database to compromise anonymity by generating unique variable combinations or rare categories. CRIS users are asked to consider whether this issue may occur and strategies to avoid compromising anonymity. Alternatively, they may wish to obtain specific ethics approval for an analysis where this risk is likely to be significant. Searching under clinicians’ names are a sensitive issue; this type of information in research would have to be justified.
CRIS Application Approval Process
The CRIS Oversight Group, led by the Chief Clinical Information Officer (CCIO) will review all requests to use CRIS as a de-identified database. It is important for the Trust to demonstrate that OHFT clinical data are used responsibly and for projects with demonstrable research and clinical importance.
The future of CRIS, as with other aspects of OHFT research, depends on successful bids for future funding. This in turn requires evidence of use of the database, hence the need to keep a record of individual projects.
The CRIS Oversight Group has a role in facilitating CRIS analyses and to advise on how best to extract robust data. The database is potentially complex and users will be encouraged to collaborate and share expertise and hands-on experience. The information submitted in the project application form will be used to provide a database for this purpose to assist future researchers.
Collaborations and Grant Applications for CRIS use
All work, which requires the use of CRIS must be reviewed and approved by the CRIS Oversight Group. This should be taken in to account when completing any applications or considering a collaboration, which require the use of CRIS data. Failure to inform the CRIS Oversight Group of a grant, research application or collaboration may result in the project being declined.
Need further help?
If you have any questions please email CRIS.admin@oxfordhealth.nhs.uk
CRIS search ideas - Top 10's
Below are links to the Top 10 priorities for future research in mental health, agreed by the Priority Setting Partnerships (PSP). Why not consider conducting a CRIS search to answer one of these questions.
James Lind brings patients, carers and clinicians together in Priority Setting Partnerships (PSPs) to identify and prioritise the Top 10 uncertainties, or unanswered questions, about the effects of treatments.
The aim of this is to make sure that health research funders are aware of the issues that matter most to patients and clinicians.
CRIS privacy and GDPR
How are patient details protected?
CRIS information is held securely with strict arrangements about who can access the information. This will include Trust staff, clinicians and approved researchers. The information will only be used for the purpose of health and care research, service evaluation, clinical audit or to contact you about future opportunities to participate in research.
Where there is a risk that you can be identified your data will only be used in research that has been independently reviewed by an ethics committee. For further information on ‘patient information and health and care research’ see the Health Research Authority (HRA) or for CRIS specific information see our CRIS Privacy Notice
Ongoing CRIS projects
Below are links to the CRIS projects currently being led by researchers at Oxford Health BRC.
Each project includes a lay summary and are arranged by their relevant research theme. For completed and published CRIS projects please view our publications tab.
- ORCHARD-CRIS Dementia
- ACECAT
- Conducting a study of people with depression who appear not to be getting better on a single medication(Extended New Mind)
- COVIDSMI
- Chronosig P2 Patient Triage NLP
- OxMIV
- NICEPsychinterventions
- Psychosis&Housing
- EIS Relapse
- EIS Cardio
- Organic Psychosis
- No ongoing CRIS projects at present
- No ongoing CRIS projects at present
- Discriminating N-Methyl-D-Aspartate Receptor-antibody encephalitis (NMDAR-Ab-E) from primary psychosis
- CHRONOSIG P1
- Prescribing Gabapentinoids
- Chronosig P3
- Service Economic Evaluation
- RECOLLECT
- Auditory Schizophrenia vs EUPD
- Child Refugee
- ClinicalInstabilityPredictorHonos
Publications
Peer Reviewed
2023
2022
2021
2020
Online
2022
Radley J, Barlow J, Johns LC. Sociodemographic characteristics associated with parenthood amongst patients with a psychotic diagnosis: a cross-sectional study using patient clinical records. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology. 2022 Apr 21; doi:10.1007/s00127-022-02279-x
Costa T, Menzat B, Engelthaler T, Fell B, Franarin T, Roque G, et al. The burden associated with, and management of, difficult-to-treat depression in patients under specialist psychiatric care in the United Kingdom. Journal of Psychopharmacology. 2022 May 4;026988112210906.
2021
2020
2019
2018
Page last reviewed: 27 August, 2024