National Trauma Data Standard (NTDS) Data Dictionary

The NTDS will be useful in:

• Developing nationwide trauma benchmarks
• Evaluating hospital and trauma systems patient outcomes
• Facilitating research efforts
• Determining national trends in trauma care
• Addressing resources for disaster and domestic preparedness
• Providing valuable information on other issues or areas of need related to trauma care

The NTDS has two primary goals and objectives:

• To define a standard set of clinical data elements that characterize trauma care at the hospital level.
• To provide meaningful inter-hospital comparisons.

1995 – Original NTDS Elements Defined

The ACS Committee on Trauma (COT) convened a consensus conference with the ATS, HRSA, NHTSA, CDC, and representatives from all trauma registry programs to define the NTDS data elements.  

1997 – First Call for Data  

2006 – New Data Dictionary Released

The NTDB releases the National Trauma Data Standard (formerly National Trauma Registry) data dictionary, developed in collaboration with HRSA, state trauma managers, trauma registry vendors, and other stakeholders in the trauma community.

2009 – TQIP Pilot Launched

2010 – TQIP Began

2012 – TQIP Process Measures Added

2014 – First NTDS Pilot Project

2015 – Piloted Fields Added

2015 – Aligned Hospital Complications and Co-Morbid Conditions

2017 – 10^th Anniversary of the NTDS

Business Structure and Management Assistance

The dataset will provide a business model for the injury community. This model will help develop:

• Protocols that are justified by factual evidence
• Budgets that can be defended by actual data
• A method to analyze performance of trauma services
• State-to-state comparison models
• Benchmarks for standards of care

Drive Policy and Funding

The dataset will allow hospitals to:

• Determine areas for potential QA intervention
• Provide data to justify new funding or support existing programs
• Provide a basis for ongoing funding support

Education—Trauma Training and Curricula

The dataset promotes the importance of trauma care in the health care system by:

• Providing a better understanding of injury trends
• Improving the quality of trauma treatment
• Modifying the existing injury prevention education and other programs

Evaluating Patient and Injury Outcomes

The dataset will help:

• Establish reliable outcome measures
• Monitor trauma systems
• Determine which treatments are effective
• Identify and reduce errors
• Identify unmet needs and priorities
• Focus on data-driven decision making
• Evaluate patients throughout the spectrum of care

Evaluating Resources for Disaster and Domestic Preparedness

The dataset will provide opportunities for improvement of current disaster policies, procedures, and preparedness by:

• Providing further analysis tools for FEMA and other organizations
• Providing better data for disaster research

Facilitating Research Efforts

The dataset will provide access to a national trauma database and Trauma Quality Improvement Program, which will:

• Identify national trends
• Provide a large sample of standardized data
• Allow opportunities to generate research hypotheses
• Facilitate national benchmarking