data use: NHS antibiotic prescribing research project
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Data uses in an NHS antibiotic prescribing research project. We drew on prior research by Itzelle Medina-Perea to produce this account.
download PDF of NHS antibiotic prescribing research project visualisation
Watch the NHS antibiotic prescribing research project animation
Proposed benefit:
- addresses public health crisis of antibiotic resistance
Potential harm:
- requires the use of sensitive patient data;
- children’s data could be shared;
- the data could be shared with pharmaceutical companies, who could eventually profit from it.
Questions to discuss or think about
- What do you think about the NHS Antibiotic Prescribing Research Project?
- Does anything surprise you about how data is being used here?
- How do you feel about how data is shared in the NHS Antibiotic Prescribing Research Project?
- Look at the proposed benefits and potential harms of the NHS Antibiotic Prescribing Research Project. What matters more to you: the proposed benefit or concern?
- Do you think the NHS Antibiotic Prescribing Research Project is fair? Why/why not?
- How much do you feel like you understand the NHS Antibiotic Prescribing Research Project?
What people think about the NHS antibiotic prescribing research project
A lot of participants supported the ‘social good’ aims of the NHS antibiotic prescribing research project:
“[It’s] for the greater good […] for health and benefits, for people, for us to learn, develop and grow in a way that’s going to make society a fairer place and people have the best opportunities in their life.”
Tanya, white British, lesbian woman, aged 55-64
But trust in and concern about health data uses varied across groups. Older participants appeared to be more comfortable with health data uses than data uses in other sectors:
“If we’d been asked to cooperate […] with a thing like this, we would have jumped at it, wouldn’t we?”
Alan, white British, heterosexual man, 65+
In contrast, health data uses seemed to concern LGBTQ+ participants more than heterosexual cisgendered participants.
“We know that some of the information about our sexual health in the past has been used to massively discriminate, to massively sort of chastise those communities. It’s interesting from that perspective that it could potentially take one person with a vendetta of some sort – or just a mistake, just a bit of human error, that could then cause ramifications for that particular group or population that maybe more – that therefore the risk might be heightened.”
Todd, white British, gay man, aged 25-34
Find out more
To find out more about what our participants said about the NHS antibiotic prescribing research project, read our health sector report or visit our archive of anonymised research data.