Data Governance Council

NACHC has invested in building a governance infrastructure to support a growing body of data-related work occurring in the clinical affairs division. External partners are sharing data with NACHC through an array of projects. As NACHC’s clinical affairs portfolio has reached a critical mass of data sharing projects, the next step is to implement a data governance structure to build trust among data partners and ensure the highest quality work products.

NACHC convened a data governance council in the fall of 2021 to develop and implementing a governance infrastructure for informatics project work. The data governance council is convened to:

• evaluate and approve or deny requests for data or analyses from internal or external sources;

• develop, codify, and disseminate policies and procedures to meet emerging data governance needs and align with stakeholder policies, agreements, and processes;

• consult on the NACHC response to privacy and security incidents related to data sharing or clinical affairs projects;

• upon request, review data sharing project issues outside of clinical affairs and make recommendations; and

• ensure long-term, broadly representative data governance for NACHC.

Priority Data Governance Issues

The priority issues that the Data Governance Council is currently focused on are:

• Developing standard request and DUA processes including revision of the NACHC DUA template and creation of a repository of DUAs and data products from all active projects

• Documenting the current and target states of data security and privacy policies and procedures for the larger NACHC team and clinical affairs data assets

• Establishing guiding principles for data use and translating those principles into procedures and governance infrastructure.