About Us
About HRDP-SK
HRDP-SK streamlines the process for researchers to access health data in Saskatchewan. Research capacity continues to be developed through HRDP-SK, and the platform may be leveraged in the future to build capacity for other secondary data purposes.
The platform is beneficial to both researchers and health organizations. Via HRDP-SK, researchers have timely, appropriate, reliable and predictable access to health system data in a remote access environment. The HRDP-SK team works collaboratively with health organizations to implement standardized and efficient processes for managing data access requests and data sharing, thus minimizing variation, redundancies and inefficiencies.
Development of the HRDP-SK is funded by the Health Data Research Network Canada (HDRN Canada) and the Saskatchewan Centre for Patient-Oriented Research (SCPOR) and its partners: eHealth Saskatchewan, University of Saskatchewan, University of Regina, Saskatchewan Polytechnic, First Nations University of Canada, Saskatchewan Health Research Foundation, Saskatchewan Cancer Agency, Saskatchewan Health Authority, Saskatchewan Health Quality Council and the Saskatchewan Ministry of Health.
Governance
Master Health Data Sharing Agreement (MHDSA)
The HRDP-SK is governed by the MHDSA. The MHDSA was signed on August 1, 2022, by Health data trustees/health system partners in Saskatchewan. This includes the Saskatchewan Ministry of Health, eHealth Saskatchewan, Saskatchewan Health Authority, Saskatchewan Health Quality Council, Saskatchewan Cancer Agency, Health Shared Services Saskatchewan (3sHealth), and Saskatchewan Association of Health Organizations. The MHDSA allows the HRPD-SK to hold individual-level data. However, HRDP-SK is not the trustee of any of the data holdings. Approval to access the data will depend on assessment from the data trustees.
History
In 2015, the Canadian Institutes for Health Research (CIHR) partnered with SCPOR on a five-year project to create improved infrastructure and support for researchers accessing healthcare data, marking the start of the HRDP-SK journey.
In 2021-2022, the prototype processes and tools needed to establish HRDP-SK were created and tested. This work was guided by an advisory group of Patient Partners, researchers, clinician scientists and health system staff. The HRDP-SK project required establishing a Master Health Data Sharing Agreement (MHDSA) between the health data trustees, which was signed in August 2022. The MHDSA is a collaborative, multi-trustee model that provides access to system data while protecting the privacy of individuals in a legal and privacy-compliant manner.
Over the next year, HRDP-SK entered a pilot phase. In this phase, the legal agreements and privacy requirements for HRDP-SK were implemented. During this period, the first five datasets were integrated into the HRDP-SK repository.
HRDP-SK approved data access for its first two researcher projects in January 2024, and the teams began conducting analysis through the platform. Researchers can now request data via the HRDP-SK website. Additional data integration work is underway to increase the number of databases available, which will allow the HRDP-SK team to support a greater breadth of research requests.
Our Team
Malori Keller, Director
Rama Rai, Privacy & Policy Lead
Francis Abayateye, Data Access Coordinator
Tara Brewer, Data Integration Lead
Kristin Dyke, Data Integration Lead
Cristina Diego-Chavez, Data Access Coordinator
Rajesh Kumar, Project Manager
Jennifer Petriew, Manager, Data Management
Jacob Chirayil, Data Engineer
Neil Klippenstein, Data Quality
Pritam Ahire, Data Engineer
Fernando Maldonado, Researcher
Nirmal Sidhu, Research Analyst
Victoria Martinez, Training and Capacity Development
Nasir Amao, Business Analyst
Acknowledgements
The HRDP-SK and the Master Health Data Sharing Agreement have been developed in collaboration with the Saskatchewan Health Authority, Saskatchewan Health Quality Council, Saskatchewan Ministry of Health, eHealth Saskatchewan, Health Shared Services Saskatchewan, Saskatchewan Association of Health Organizations and the Saskatchewan Cancer Agency.
We would like to thank the privacy officers, contract and legal representatives, Patient Partners, researchers and health system staff who have collaborated and provided feedback into this work. Thank you to our Advisory Committee members.
The HRDP-SK team was guided by a group of Patient Partners, researchers and health system staff:
Brenda Andreas
Dinesh Dharel
Sarah Donkers
Charity Evans
Gary Groot
Nedeene Hudema
Tyler Moss
Heather Murray
Jessica Osei
Juan-Nicholas Pena-Sanchez
Erika Penz
Chris Plishka
Susan Tupper