%0 Journal Article
%T Case identification of non-traumatic brain injury in youth using linked population data.
%A Slykerman RF
%A Clasby BE
%A Chong J
%A Edward K
%A Milne BJ
%A Temperton H
%A Thabrew H
%A Bowden N
%J BMC Neurol
%V 24
%N 1
%D 2024 Mar 2
%M 38429681
%F 2.903
%R 10.1186/s12883-024-03575-6
%X <B>BACKGROUND: </B>Population-level administrative data provides a cost-effective means of monitoring health outcomes and service needs of clinical populations. This study aimed to present a method for case identification of non-traumatic brain injury in population-level data and to examine the association with sociodemographic factors.<BR><B>METHODS: </B>An estimated resident population of youth aged 0-24 years was constructed using population-level datasets within the New Zealand Integrated Data Infrastructure. A clinical consensus committee reviewed the International Classification of Diseases Ninth and Tenth Editions codes and Read codes for inclusion in a case definition. Cases were those with at least one non-traumatic brain injury code present in the five years up until 30 June 2018 in one of four databases in the Integrated Data Infrastructure. Rates of non-traumatic brain injury were examined, both including and excluding birth injury codes and across age, sex, ethnicity, and socioeconomic deprivation groups.<BR><B>RESULTS: </B>Of the 1 579 089 youth aged 0-24 years on 30 June 2018, 8154 (0.52%) were identified as having one of the brain injury codes in the five-years to 30 June 2018. Rates of non-traumatic brain injury were higher in males, children aged 0-4 years, Māori and Pacific young people, and youth living with high levels of social deprivation.<BR><B>CONCLUSIONS: </B>This study presents a comprehensive method for case identification of non-traumatic brain injury using national population-level administrative data.