CCHE Seminar Series: The health data landscape in Canada: a brave new(ish) world for researchers

Ted McDonald

University of New Brunswick

Friday February 12th, 2020, 10am-12pm, Zoom

Abstract: Canada has lagged behind other countries in making effective use of administrative health data, hampering health policy planning and hindering research. Over the past decade, recent advances at both the provincial and federal levels as well as a renewed focus on cooperation have narrowed Canada’s comparative disadvantage. This presentation will review recent progress made in Canada towards a more unified approach to using personal health data for research and policy. A particular focus will be on how national collaborations are starting to break down data silos within and between provinces, moving researchers closer to being able to operationalize the ‘living lab’ that is Canada’s 13 provincial and territorial health systems.

Dr. Ted McDonald is a Professor of Economics at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton. He holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Melbourne. He is the founding Director of the NB Institute for Research, Data and Training, New Brunswick’s only provincial administrative data centre. He is the Chair of the Canadian Research Data Centre Network Academic Council, a member of the CRDCN Board, and a member of executive committee of Health Data Research Network Canada as well as the New Brunswick lead of the Maritime SPOR SUPPORT Unit (MSSU). Dr. McDonald is a UNB research scholar for 2020-22 and in 2019 he was co-winner of the Mike McCracken award for Economics Statistics, awarded by the Canadian Economics Association.

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