Background Providing timely reporting and analysis is increasingly important in every sphere of professional life. However, data in our organisation (and, anecdotally, palliative care in general) was mainly processed manually using spreadsheets, introducing delays and occasion for human error. Without the resources of private sector organisations, the implementation of automated data processing systems has not been possible.

Aim(s) The project aimed to create a prototype of a daily automated process that would take clinical data from our electronic patient record (EPR) system and present it for simple reporting. This would then allow us to report using current patient care information for clinical and organisational managers with greater flexibility than manual processing.

Methods A feature was enabled in our EPR, SystmOne, to send us an extract of raw clinical data tables each day. Automated scripts were written to insert the data into our database and transform it for reporting, before visualising the data using PowerBI.

Results This automation reduced the lead time required for core clinical reporting from – in some cases – upwards of six weeks down to one day. It has reduced the occasion for human error substantially by establishing a consistent process that runs in exactly the same way every day. It dramatically reduced our response time when ad-hoc analysis is required, as we have a detailed and flexible dataset prepared which can answer many questions we have not yet thought to ask.

Conclusions Automating our data processing has delivered substantial benefits in timeliness, reliability and efficiency in our analysis and reporting. This is being used by clinical teams, fundraising, communications and senior leadership, as well as in representing our work to commissioners. It establishes what can be achieved without significant investment and sets a new baseline for data analysis in our organisation.