Member in the Spotlight - The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW)

Who are they?

Injury Data Unit, Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.

What are they known for?

The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) is an independent statutory Australian Government agency with more than 35 years of experience working with health and welfare data. Our vision is to provide stronger evidence (data and information) for better decisions and improved health and welfare for all Australians. The Injury Data Unit manages AIHW’s injury work program, which supports injury surveillance and prevention initiatives by presenting comprehensive nationwide data on injury trends and causes that users can engage with to inform research and policy, and guide service planning and delivery. This is done via:

• comprehensive annual reporting, such as Injury in Australia and Sports injury in Australia

• targeted ‘in-focus’ analysis and reports on specific topics

• ad hoc data requests and expert advice

• ongoing work to identify and address data gaps.

What might we not know?

Our data is sourced from major administrative health data sets including the National Hospital Morbidity Database, the National Non-admitted Patient Emergency Department Care Database and the National Mortality Database. 

While AIHW is well known for its reports and published data, there is less visibility of the significant work involved in developing and maintaining these national health data assets.

The AIHW oversees national data development, including mandatory and best endeavours datasets, and provides advice on health information standards, priorities and emerging issues. We also contribute to key statistical protocols, such as data linkage, geocoding and data anonymisation.

This work relies on consistent, nationally agreed data standards to ensure interoperability. It requires extensive consultation and stakeholder engagement and often unanimous agreement across jurisdictions - work that is substantial and long-term but often not as visible externally.

Organisation priorities for injury prevention

• Providing trusted and comprehensive national data on injury trends and causes to inform research, policy, and service planning.

• Identifying emerging trends in injury data (for example, we are currently undertaking new work looking at e-bikes and e-scooters).

• Using our linked data asset (the National Health Data Hub) to generate deeper insights into the nature, extent and longer-term impacts of injury.

• Identifying and working to address key data gaps, including projects to improve emergency department, transport, sports and primary health care injury data.

Anything else about your organisation to share:

Recent release:

• 19 May 2026: Physical activity in Australia: modelling benefits, injury risk and health costs - Australian Institute of Health and Welfare

Upcoming releases:

• 18 June 2026: Injury in Australia, About - Australian Institute of Health and Welfare

• 24 June 2026: Sports injury in Australia, About - Australian Institute of Health and Welfare 

• 22 July 2026: Injuries occurring among admitted patients and Injury hospitalisations among health care workers

Reports currently in the pipeline:

• E-scooter and e-bike injuries and deaths in Australia: national trends and data limitations

• The impact of fall risk-increasing drugs (FRIDs) on fall-related injuries among older adults 

• Non-fall injuries in older adults

• The relationship between musculoskeletal conditions and injury

Who are the organisation members - we want to know them! What are they working on at the moment?

• Jacqueline Rek, Unit Head

• Sarah Ahmed, Project Lead, Transport data

• Sam Grimshaw, Project Lead, Sports Injury

• Claudia Slimings, Project Lead, Injury reporting

• Amy Allan, Data Analyst, Sports Injury

• Callin Ivanovici, Data Analyst, Injury reporting

• Mathieu Legros, Data Analyst, Injury reporting

• Sam Jones, Data Analyst (currently on maternity leave)

Who would be your dream injury prevention dinner guest?

We’d like to invite a clinical coder who works on injury data case by case to discuss the challenges to coding key details such as activity and place of occurrence, where data is often missing.

We’d also like to chat about what improvements they anticipate as a result of the transition to ICD‑11, particularly regarding capture of things like emerging product-related injuries (like e‑scooters), the circumstances around injuries, and their outcomes. We recently attended an interesting presentation by clinical coders at Canberra Hospital and we’d love to follow on from that to chat further about data and coding more specific to injury.

AIHW’s Injury Data Unit. (note: this was taken in November 2025. We are located across the ACT, Tasmania, Victoria and New South Wales so we don’t get to see each other in person much!). Back standing L-R: Sam Grimshaw, Claudia Slimings, Sam Jones, Jacqueline Rek, Mathieu Legros, Sarah Ahmed. Front sitting L-R: Callin Ivanovici, Katherine Brown (has since left the unit).

Our data and reports can be found at: Injury Overview - Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.