{"id":3697,"date":"2018-02-26T12:02:42","date_gmt":"2018-02-26T17:02:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/?page_id=3697"},"modified":"2025-04-09T11:47:52","modified_gmt":"2025-04-09T15:47:52","slug":"data-collection-planning","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/resources\/data-collection-planning\/","title":{"rendered":"Data Collection Planning"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Data is essential to understand if the changes that we make are resulting in improvement. To begin, you must determine your data collection plan. Quality improvement data is often gathered on a set of measures or family of measures which include the following: outcome measures to track progress toward the aim or end goal of the project; process measures to monitor key steps influencing the outcome; and balancing measures to ensure improvements do not create unintended negative effects within your system. Data collection can start as simple count data collection and over time become more complex as you learn more about the project and have a better understanding of your family of measures.<\/p>\n<h2>Key Steps<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Understand both your current state and project aim\/goal<\/li>\n<li>Determine your family of measures (outcome, process, and balancing measures)<\/li>\n<li>Consider potential sources and how you will regularly obtain your data<\/li>\n<li>Develop a method to track your data over time (i.e. excel)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Resources to Get Started<\/h2>\n<table style=\"border-collapse: collapse;width: 97.564%;height: 118px\">\n<tbody>\n<tr style=\"height: 98px\">\n<td style=\"width: 7.60678%;text-align: center;height: 98px\"><strong><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-8060\" src=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2022\/01\/Icon-Read.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"137\" height=\"137\" \/><\/strong><strong>Read<\/strong><\/td>\n<td style=\"width: 93.2057%;height: 98px\">\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ihi.org\/insights\/measurement-cornerstone-quality-improvement\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Measurement: The Cornerstone of Quality Improvement<\/a> \u2013 This brief article provides an overview for why data collection and measure are essential for QI projects and tips for getting started.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ihi.org\/how-improve-model-improvement-establishing-measures\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Model for Improvement: Establishing Measures<\/a> \u2013 The brief article from the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) provides tips on how to determine your family of measures.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/integrationacademy.ahrq.gov\/products\/playbooks\/behavioral-health-and-primary-care\/implementing-plan\/collect-and-use-data-quality-improvement\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Collect and Use Data for Quality Improvement<\/a> \u2013 This article from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Integration Academy outlines tips and resources to plan for data collection.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2021\/02\/Epic2017-Reporting-Manual.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">EPIC Reporting Manual<\/a>\u2013 This manual provides detailed info on how to protect Patient Health Information (PHI) on pages 1, 9-10)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr style=\"height: 23px\">\n<td style=\"width: 7.60678%;height: 10px;text-align: center\"><strong><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-8065\" src=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2022\/01\/Icon-Use-2-300x300.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2022\/01\/Icon-Use-2-300x300.png 300w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2022\/01\/Icon-Use-2-1024x1024.png 1024w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2022\/01\/Icon-Use-2-150x150.png 150w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2022\/01\/Icon-Use-2-768x768.png 768w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2022\/01\/Icon-Use-2-1536x1536.png 1536w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2022\/01\/Icon-Use-2-2048x2048.png 2048w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2022\/01\/Icon-Use-2-600x600.png 600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/>Use<\/strong><\/td>\n<td style=\"width: 93.2057%;height: 10px\">\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/463\/2025\/03\/Blank-Measure-Tracking-Sheet_Tool-kit.xlsx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Measure Tracking Sheet<\/a> \u2013 Simple manual data collection is a great way to get started with collecting your data. This template includes areas for you to count data for your outcome and process measures.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<h2>Related QI Concepts<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/resources\/data-visualization-analysis\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Data Visualization &amp; Analysis<\/a> \u2013 Once you have collected your data, it is important to develop a way to display and analyze this information. It is the next step to determine whether your work is resulting improvement.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/resources\/key-driver-diagram\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Driver Diagram<\/a> \u2013 This tool helps identify \u201cdrivers\u201d or key influences that can impact your project. The driver diagram can help identify potential family of measures.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/resources\/institutional-review-board\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Institutional Review Board (IRB)<\/a> \u2013 In healthcare QI project, you may often rely on collecting patient-related data. For that reason, you will likely need to submit your project through IRB.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/resources\/pdsas-and-counting-things\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA)<\/a> \u2013 PDSAs are the change ideas that drive QI projects and will be one of the data points that you will need to collect over time.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Data is essential to understand if the changes that we make are resulting in improvement. To begin, you must determine your data collection plan. Quality improvement data is often gathered on a set of measures or family of measures which include the following: outcome measures to track progress toward the aim or end goal of &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/resources\/data-collection-planning\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about Data Collection Planning\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":80925,"featured_media":0,"parent":210,"menu_order":83,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"class_list":["post-3697","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","odd"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Data Collection Planning - Institute for Healthcare Quality Improvement<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/ihqi\/resources\/data-collection-planning\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Data Collection Planning - Institute for Healthcare Quality Improvement\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Data is essential to understand if the changes that we make are resulting in improvement. 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