An Historical Overview to Date ... releases, social media posts and video infographics to translate the issue of drowning and our advocacy efforts to the general.
ORAL PRESENTATION
The Royal Life Saving National Fatal Drowning Database: An Historical Overview to Date Ms Amy E Peden1 Royal Life Saving Society - Australia, Broadway, Australia
1
Data 1, Ballroom 2, November 4, 2015, 1:30 PM - 3:00 PM Background For the past 20 years Royal Life Saving Society – Australia (RLS) has been producing an annual National Drowning Report [1], that at a minimum identifies the age, sex, geographic location, category of aquatic location and type of activity being undertaken immediately prior to unintentional fatal drowning in all Australian waterways. Information is primarily gathered from coronial records via the National Coronial Information System (NCIS) [2]. Additional information about the drowning incident is drawn from a range of other sources including media reports and police reports. Aims The RLS National Fatal Drowning Database aims to: • Record all unintentional fatal drowning deaths that occur in Australian waterways • House data in one location with consistently applied coding across a range of variables that is regularly checked and updated against the NCIS • Provide a dataset that can be easily interrogated to respond to enquiries in a timely fashion Target(s) The power of the database is that it can be used to translate drowning prevention research and advocacy in a range of different formats to a wide range of audiences including the general public, government, the media and aquatics industry among many others. Implementation Data collated through annual drowning reports is collected in the same format as the RLS Database in an SPSS database [3]. Once data is confirmed for each financial year it is fed into the Database. All cases in the RLS Database are checked against the NCIS on a regular basis and information is updated as cases close within the coronial system. Once a case has been closed within the coronial system and all available information has been collated against the variables the case will not need to be checked again unless additional variables are added. A coding manual has been developed that sits alongside the Database and guides the researcher in determining both how to code and the mechanics of entering the data into the database to ensure consistency across each variable collected for each case. Results As at January 2015 – the Royal Life Saving National Fatal Drowning Database has 12 financial years of data in it, amounting to over 3,500 individual cases. Each case has a maximum of 103 variables where data can be added. Variables record a range of information including country of birth, medical conditions, day of week of drowning incident, season, involvement of drugs and alcohol (including blood concentrations) and information that allows us to link the location of the drowning with the relevant local government authority among many others. Discussion Data is used in a wide variety of ways to target different audience groups. The database has been used to generate media releases, social media posts and video infographics to translate the issue of drowning and our advocacy efforts to the general public. Specific enquiries have been run to contribute to research (including long term reviews of fatal drowning within a particular age group or location), media enquiries and to substantiate submissions to government. Data quality, electronic availability of data and timeliness of reporting do vary between State and Territory jurisdictions which can present challenges when conducting research on a national scale but the longevity of the National Fatal Drowning Database allows us to continually monitor and update data from across the jurisdictions. Conclusion The development of the Royal Life Saving National Fatal Drowning Database has been a valuable project and a legacy item for many years to come. It provides the basis for greater collaboration domestically and internationally on drowning data collection and drowning prevention research. Acknowledgements The drowning prevention research of the Royal Life Saving Society – Australia is supported by the Australian Government. References 1. Royal Life Saving Society - Australia. Royal Life Saving National Drowning Report 2014 2014. 2. National Coroners Information System. National Coroners Information System Coding Manual and User Guide Version 3. Southbank: Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine, 2007. 3. SPSS Inc. IBM SPSS Statistics 21.1. Chicago, Illinois: IBM; 2012.
