Version: 1.0.0 | Published: 5 Mar 2025 | Updated: 277 days ago
Society of Acute Medicine Benchmarking Audit – National Summer 2019 to 2023
Dataset
Documentation
Associated Media:
Description:
The Society for Acute Medicine (SAM) Benchmarking Audit (SAMBA) is a national benchmark audit of acute medical care. The aim of SAMBA is to describe the severity of illness of acute medical patients presenting to Acute Medicine, the speed of their assessment, their pathway and progress at seven days after admission and to provide a comparison for each participating unit with the national average (or ‘benchmark’).
SAMBA normally takes place at least once a year. Data are collected for patients admitted over a 24-hour period, with follow up of clinical outcomes. The dataset consists of an audit of a day in Summer each year from 2019-2023 (excluding 2020).
It includes 34,103 patients in the SAMBA audit dataset containing unit structure and staffing levels, patient demographics (age and gender), severity of illness at presentation using an early warning score (e.g. NEWS2), frailty and pathway of care through the hospital and readmission. The dataset consists of an audit of a day in Summer 2019-2023 (excluding 2020).
Geography: Recruitment to SAMBA audits are open to all hospitals in the UK receiving acutely unwell medical patients. Non-acute and community hospitals were excluded.
The SAMBA dataset draws on contributions from across all four nations of the UK. Over the years, patient data was submitted by more than 100 hospitals in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, as well as Jersey. The dataset has grown each year, reflecting increasing engagement from healthcare providers across the country.
Data set availability: Data access is available via the PIONEER Hub for projects which will benefit the public or patients. This can be by developing a new understanding of disease, by providing insights into how to improve care, or by developing new models, tools, treatments, or care processes. Data access can be provided to NHS, academic, commercial, policy and third sector organisations. Applications from SMEs are welcome. There is a single data access process, with public oversight provided by our public review committee, the Data Trust Committee. Contact pioneer@uhb.nhs.uk or visit www.pioneerdatahub.co.uk for more details.
Available supplementary data: To supplement the national audit data, PIONEER can provide more granular, longitudinal patient-level insights. This includes matched controls, ambulance and community data, and unstructured data (such as images).
Available supplementary support: Analytics, model build, validation & refinement; A.I. support. Data partner support for ETL (extract, transform & load) processes. Bespoke and “off the shelf” Trusted Research Environment (TRE) build and run. Consultancy with clinical, patient & end-user and purchaser access/ support. Support for regulatory requirements. Cohort discovery. Data-driven trials and “fast screen” services to assess population size.
Coverage
Typical Age Range:
16-150
Follow Up:
0 - 6 Months
Pathway:
The dataset captures patients presenting to acute medical services across over
100 hospitals within the UK, providing a representative sample of acute medical
presentations during the specified timeframe. Patients may be discharged
directly or admitted to hospital. National Data Opt-Outs have been applied,
ensuring appropriate exclusions. This dataset focuses solely on the acute
presentation; however, for selected hospitals, additional longitudinal data can
be provided on request to enrich the information, including prior and subsequent
hospital contacts, outpatient appointments, ambulance records (999), NHS 111
interactions, and other relevant healthcare encounters.
Provenance
Origin
Purposes:
Audit
Sources:
EPR
Collection Situations:
Secondary care - Accident and Emergency
Temporal
Accrual Periodicity:
Static
Distribution Release Date:
06 March 2025
Start Date:
01 January 2019
End Date:
31 December 2023
Time Lag:
Less than 1 week
Accessibility
Access
Access Service:
Trusted Research Environments (TRE) are built using Microsoft Azure services and
hosted in the UK to provide research teams a safe, secure and agile environment
which allows users to quickly analyse, interpret and form an enriched view of
primary care information through a range of integrated datasets. Health data
collated from multiple sources is ingested into a secure data lake which will
then allow subsets of data to be made available to research teams on approval of
a data request. Once approved a customer specific TRE is made available with a
standard set of leading analytical tools from Microsoft including Azure
Databricks, Azure Machine Learning, Azure SQL and Azure Synapse (for large-scale
data warehouses). Specific tools can be provided at an additional cost over the
standard platform data access charge and the PIONEER team will work with you to
determine your exact needs. Access to the TRE is managed using the latest
virtual desktop technology to provide a safe and secure end-user experience. By
utilising leading edge design PIONEER are able to create TREs rapidly to enable
us to service any customer requirement.
Access Request Cost:
www.pioneerdatahub.co.uk/data/data-services-costs/
Delivery Lead Time:
1-2 months
Jurisdictions:
GB
Data Controller:
University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust
Data Processor:
NOT APPLICABLE
Usage
Data Use Limitations:
General research use
Data Use Requirements:
Project-specific restrictions
Resource Creators:
This publication uses data from PIONEER, an ethically approved database and analytical environment (East Midlands Derby Research Ethics 20/EM/158). SAMBA is funded by the Society for Acute Medicine. Approval has been given for the use of longitudinal data for research (HRA 21/HRA/419). Further information regarding the Society for Acute Medicine Benchmarking Audit, including how to take part, is available at https://www.acutemedicine.org.uk/samba-new/ .
Format and Standards
Vocabulary Encoding Schemes:
LOCAL
Conforms To:
LOCAL
Languages:
en
Formats:
excel
Observations
Statistical Population
Population Description
Population Size
Measured Property
Observation Date
Persons
SAMBA Patients - Summer 4 years excluding Summer 2020
34103
Count
19 February 2025