Ensuring Data Accuracy
- One of the major challenges is ensuring that accurate and complete data are collected. There are opportunities to audit information to enhance the reliability of the measurements.
- Case Ascertainment: All cases must be accounted for when tracking SCA survival rates. Patients who may be defibrillated once and awaken quickly are sometimes missed in data collection systems. Often, identifying victims who die early is easier than tracking survivors. However, every effort should be used to assure that there is an outcome (Alive/Dead at hospital discharge) for each individual in the database. Several resources available on the Internet allowsuch searches including the Social Security Death Index.
- Effect of Missing Data
- If survivors are missed, the calculated survival rate will be falsely low.
- If there are many cases missing outcome, an accurate survival rate cannot be calculated.