About us
History
The Oxford RCGP Clinical Informatics Digital Hub (ORCHID) is a database which was part of the development of one of Europe's oldest general practice sentinel networks. The Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) Research and Surveillance Centre has been the primary source for disease surveillance in England since 1957.
The ORCHID database is a resource for UK-wide health research. It is a Trusted Research Environment (TRE) with expertly curated themed datasets and is used to undertake health research e.g. observational (cohort) and interventional (trial) studies.
The University of Oxford has been the provider of the Oxford-RCGP Research and Surveillance Centre (RSC) since 2019, and is commissioned by the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) to provide surveillance services, in partnership with RCGP, across general practices in England. The RSC is based within the Clinical Informatics and Health Outcomes Research Group, which is part of the Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences.
The Oxford-RCGP RSC network has grown significantly since 2020, from approximately 500 to over 2,000 general practices in England. The network enables aggregated health related data to be used for regular surveillance reporting to UKHSA. The Oxford-RCGP RSC also undertakes research on a project-by-project basis which can include practices in England and the devolved nations.
What the University of Oxford provides to UKHSA for surveillance
- Management of a network of practices representative of at least 30% of patients registered at GP practices within England
- Management of virology and serology samples from patients presenting with ARI symptoms to GP practices
- Weekly Linked Virology Dataset
- Weekly Morbidity Data
- Weekly Syndromic Surveillance
- Weekly Reports including a public facing report, published on RCGP’s website - https://www.rcgp.org.uk/representing-you/research-at-rcgp/research-surveillance-centre/public-health-data
- Weekly updated virology and serology dashboards – add links
- Quarterly Serology Dataset
- Annual: Influenza Vaccine Effectiveness Dataset
- Annual reports for UKHSA https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/infectious-diseases-impacting-england-2025-report and RCGP https://www.rcgp.org.uk/representing-you/research-at-rcgp/research-surveillance-centre/public-health-data
- Ad Hoc Data Extracts
