FAQs about working with mental health data#

Last modified: 19 Nov 2025

Answers to researchers' questions about working with mental health data.

In the MHSDS, why are there records that pre-date April 2016 (when the dataset was established)?

The data which pre-date the MHSDS indicate referral starts etc. which were open before the MHSDS was established. These data submissions were only made for open referrals. No closed referrals are submitted through MHSDS and no data has been brought across from previous datasets (e.g Mental Health Minimum Data Set).

Why do some variables in the MHSDS appear to be identical?

In the referrals table (MSH101), the following pairs of variables have the same content, with the second one being the de-identified ('deid') version of the first:

• pservcierequestid & servicerequestedid_deid

• puniqservreqid & uniqservreqid_deid