The Falls and Fragility Fracture Audit Programme (FFFAP) has data available for healthcare professionals and academic institutions to access for research and analysis purposes.
Data is available from:
- National Hip Fracture Database (NHFD)
- Fracture Liaison Service Database (FLS-DB)
- National Audit of Inpatient Falls (NAIF)
This page and supporting documentation provide a guide for those wishing to access the data, giving potential timeframes as well as showing what is currently available in the public domain for free without the need for an application.
Please be aware that the data are more reliable post 2011.
Guidance on accessing FFFAP public data
A list of FFFAP workstream data that are freely available online is available to download from this page, along with a summary of the findings.
If the publicly available data do not meet your needs, please follow the ‘how to apply for data not publicly available’ section to ascertain which level of data you need for your study and the steps you must go through to gain approval from FFFAP. You will then need to submit your application to the data controllers HQIP and NHS England for ultimate approval and data release.
How to apply for data not publicly available
There are several levels of data that are not publicly available and will require you to go through an application process. To view what you should expect and need to do, depending on the complexity of your data request, please refer to our ‘guidance for submitting data application requests’ in the downloads section at the bottom of this page. Further information is available from HQIP on Health Data Access and designing your data project, and NHS Digital on Fundamentals of using routinely collected healthcare data in research.
Before you formally apply for data, projects should be suitably researched prior to submitting a FFFAP expression of interest (EoI) form which can be downloaded at the bottom of this page. Once you have completed the EoI form for your study please send it to fffap@rcp.ac.uk. It will be reviewed by the FFFAP Scientific and Publications Committee within 4 weeks.
After this stage, the committee will either invite you to complete a basic release form for HQIP, start a full data sharing agreement application (DSA) process or provide feedback of any overlap with previous work, including any enhancements or concerns before your application can proceed.
Feasibility of analysis should also be considered. Linkage to data which detail life status at a specified time point can be provided. However, patient-identifiable information will not be released.
FFFAP data are released on condition of being used for a specified purpose. Data will only be released under a binding DSA detailing the purposes of analysis, and must be returned or destroyed at the end of the period specified. Exploratory analysis is not permitted.
Research projects will require ethical approval (or written confirmation that approval is not required). Some projects not covered under existing FFFAP approvals from the Confidentiality Advisory Group (CAG) may require a standalone CAG approval by the applicant.
Once the data has been obtained, the applicant's responsibilities include:
- updating FFFFAP on projected publication date
- provide a near-final draft for review and comment
- acknowledging FFFAP in all work
- agreeing to be identified in the online database of previous and ongoing projects
- providing quarterly written updates of progress to FFFAP.
Data flow diagrams for each of the programme workstreams are available here.
Please note that there may be charges involved in processing your application and data release from the RCP, Crown database and HQIP – please see the expression of interest form for more details.