HIQA has published a number of national standards to promote and guide effective, safe and accurate sharing of health information.

• National-standards-information-management-health-and-social-care
• National Standard for a Clinical Summary (Patient Summary) | 2019
• National Standard for ePrescribing (Prescription Dataset) | 2018  
• National Standard for a Demographic Dataset, with Guidance (Health and social care settings)

-> More Health Information Standards

Using an implementation science approach, HIQA develops tools to support the health and social care sector to produce high-quality health information in order to support the delivery of safe care, decision-making, monitoring and planning.

Data quality tools:

• Guidance on a data quality framework
• Online Learning Course on Data Quality
• Data Quality Assessment Tool for health and social care

Information governance:

• Guidance on information governance for health and social care services in Ireland

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs):

• Guidance on developing KPIs and minimum data sets

eHealth:

• Key eHealth Terms
• eHealth in Ireland Frequently Asked Questions

More implementation tools and guidance

HIQA gathers and synthesises national and international evidence to inform policy and practice in Ireland and to produce evidence-based recommendations.

We engage with the public, professionals and other key stakeholders to collect evidence that helps inform policy on Health Information :

• National Engagement on Digital Health and Social Care
• National Public Engagement Survey on Health Information  

We conduct research, best practice international reviews and analysis to ensure standards, policy and practice are informed by evidence:

• International review of national health and social care data collections
• Guidance on Clinical Terminologies and Classifications
• Guidance on Messaging Standards for Ireland

More evidence review publications

Link to other health information resources
             
We also develop recommendations to support the effective management of health information:

• Recommendations on the ICT enablement of older persons services
• Recommendations on the Implementation of a National Electronic Patient Summary in Ireland
• Recommendations on adoption of SNOMED CT

More health information recommendations

Review programme

HIQA undertakes review programmes to assess compliance with national standards for national data collections and health services in Ireland. The aim of these programmes is to drive quality improvements by identifying areas of good practice and areas where improvements are necessary.

• Guide to HIQA’s review of national data collections
• Guide to HIQA's review programme of eHealth services in Ireland
• Latest review programme publications

Assessment Judgment Framework

The Assessment Judgment Framework guides services and organisations on the questions that HIQA inspectors will ask to assess compliance with the National Standards for Information Management in Health and Social Care.

• Guide to the Assessment Judgement Framework.pdf

Self-Assessment Tool for health and social care organisations
The Self-Assessment Tool helps services and organisations determine the extent to which they comply with the standards, and identify areas of good practice and where improvement is needed.

We support the implementation of EU regulation in Ireland through our involvement in EU-funded projects.

The HealthData@IE project (2023-2027) supports the implementation of the European Health Data Space (EHDS).

The QUANTUM project (2024 –2026) creates a common system for labeling data that can be used across Europe to report on the quality and usefulness of datasets.

National health and social care data collections are national repositories of routinely collected health and social care data in Ireland. 

HIQA has compiled a catalogue of all national health and social care data collections in Ireland. 

View the Catalogue of National Data Collections
View the interactive catalogue of national data collections