Overview of key data sources: Hospital discharges

The Scottish Morbidity Record (SMR01) is an episode-based record relating to all inpatients and day cases discharged from non-psychiatric, non-obstetric wards in Scottish hospitals (acute hospital admissions).  They have been computerised since 1968.  A record is formed when a patient is discharged from hospital, changes consultant or is transferred to another hospital or hospital department.  Approximately 1 million records are created annually.  The range of information collected was expanded and codes changed from April 1996 with the introduction of the core patient profile information system (COPPISH). 

SMR01s contain clinical and non-clinical data including information on locations and transfers, waiting times, referral types, diagnostic information and operation and procedure information.  Details are given in the ISD health and social care data dictionary [from this page follow the links to datasets at the top of the page].

Since 1989, information from the SMR01s has been used to plan the financial management of hospitals so this should ensure that completeness of ascertainment is high.  Information on completeness of SMR01 returns is regularly reported by ISD.

The target for SMRs to be submitted to ISD is 6 weeks after discharge/attendance.  This is monitored in the timeliness of SMRs tables.

Completion of the SMR01 is often delegated to clerical staff unsupervised by clinicians, making quality assessment very important.  Detailed quality assessments of the SMR01 data, using the full medical records, are carried out every few years by the quality assurance and accreditation unit in ISD Scotland.  The most recent report of the ISD QA team looks at the quality of the SMR01 2002-2004 returns.

Click here to find out about the linked SMR01/Cancer/GRO Deaths/SMR04 database held in ISD.