Experience with sociodemographic data collection in the Canadian paediatric surgical context: A quality improvement initiative

Jeannette P So; Kayla Wiebe; Simon Kelley; Clyde Matava; Roxanne Kirsch

doi:10.1093/pch/pxae093

Experience with sociodemographic data collection in the Canadian paediatric surgical context: A quality improvement initiative

Paediatr Child Health. 2024 Dec 15;30(2):49-55. doi: 10.1093/pch/pxae093. eCollection 2025 May.

Authors

Jeannette P So¹, Kayla Wiebe^{2

3}, Simon Kelley⁴, Clyde Matava⁵, Roxanne Kirsch^{2

6}

Affiliations

¹ Peri-Operative Services, The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
² Department of Bioethics, The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
³ Graduate Department of Philosophy, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
⁴ Division of Orthopaedic Surgery, The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
⁵ Department of Anesthesia and Pain Medicine, The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
⁶ Department of Critical Care Medicine, The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

PMID: 40452748
PMCID: PMC12122204 (available on 2025-12-15)
DOI: 10.1093/pch/pxae093

Abstract

Groups that experience social inequities have poorer health outcomes; however, Canadian healthcare institutions do not routinely collect data to identify those with health inequities. This quality improvement initiative assessed response rates for different methods of sociodemographic data collection using a questionnaire developed to support the ethical prioritization of paediatric non-urgent surgery. Of the 329 families contacted, 85.4% (281/329) completed the questionnaire and of those, 79.7% (224/281) provided sociodemographic data. Surgeon asking in the clinic had the highest response rate (100.0%, 5/5), followed by phone calls from surgical booking administrators (81.6%, 93/114), and a research assistant asking in the clinic (81.0%, 34/42). Sociodemographic data collection is feasible in a Canadian paediatric hospital setting and response rates were higher when completed in person and by staff supporting the care of the patient. The next steps will be to incorporate patient social determinants of health data into decision-making for surgical prioritization.

Keywords: Health inequities; Paediatric surgery; Self-report; Surveys and questionnaires.

© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Canadian Paediatric Society. All rights reserved. For commercial re-use, please contact reprints@oup.com for reprints and translation rights for reprints. All other permissions can be obtained through our RightsLink service via the Permissions link on the article page on our site—for further information please contact journals.permissions@oup.com.