Using health record linkage in the UK Millennium Cohort Study to investigate childhood obesity, asthma, infections and immunisations in early life. (360G-Wellcome-087389_B_08_Z)

The UK is internationally renowned for birth cohort studies which have made substantial contributions to understanding of disease and health across the life course. The UK Millennium Cohort Study was established to examine the social, economic and healthrelated circumstances of British children born in the new century and includes children from disadvantaged social circumstances, ethnic minorities and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. We propose to enhance the information collected in surveys at ages 9 months, 3, 5 and 7 years by linking, with parental consent, to electronic hospital episode records from birth to 7 years in order to address key questions relevant to children’s health. These include the health service implications of early life onset of obesity and overweight, the association of infections in early life with asthma and allergic disorders in childhood and the extent to which children with disabling conditions use health services in first 7 years of life. A second goal is to examine the quality of recording of ethnicity in electronic health records by comparing the latter to cohort parental report of ethnicity. Finally we will determine the feasibility and value of linking cohort members to their electronic primary care records.