Comparing the Quality of Primary Care Electronic Health Record Data in Australia and Canada: Case Study in Osteoarthritis

Abstract

Background: General practice electronic health records (EHRs) contain a wealth of patient information. However, these data are collected for clinical purposes. Hence, questions remain around the suitability of using these data for other purposes, including epidemiological research, developing and validating clinical prediction models, conducting audits, and informing policy. Objective: This study aimed to compare the quality of osteoarthritis-related data in Australian and Canadian general practice EHRs for externally validating a clinical prediction model for total knee replacement surgery. Methods: A data quality assessment was conducted on 201,462 patient general practice EHRs from Austra..