About CSOR

Why is CSOR important?

Half a million children in England and Wales undergo surgery each year. In 2011, the National Confidential Enquiry into Patient Outcomes and Death (NCEPOD) review of children's surgery in the UK concluded there was room to improve the number of these children that were successfully treated.

Across the UK, there is significant variation in the way children are treated for surgical conditions (conditions which usually, but not always, require an operation). However, at the moment, we do not know which parts of this variation affect how successfully children are treated. It will only be possible to find this out if reliable information can be collected about how children are currently treated, and this information can be linked to information about their long-term health and wellbeing. The CSOR programme aims to do just this. Additionally, the programme aims to provide a mechanism by which hospitals can compare their own practice to that of others, and elements of good practice can be easily identified and shared. By trying to identify and promote areas of best practice, the CSOR programme will hopefully provide a mechanism for improving the number of children that are successfully treated, as well as improving the experience of children and their carers.

What is CSOR doing?

The CSOR programme is a five-year collaboration between the National Perinatal Epidemiology Unit, paediatric surgeons from Oxford, Southampton, Glasgow, Alder Hey, Cambridge, Royal Manchester, Chelsea & Westminster, Birmingham, Evelina London and Great Ormond Street Children's Hospitals, and parents of children who have undergone early surgery. It is funded by the National Institute for Health Research.

The programme is designed to investigate whether it is possible to reduce unwarranted variation in the health and wellbeing of children undergoing early surgery in different hospitals by:

• Collecting information from both parents and routine healthcare sources about the health and wellbeing of children who have undergone early surgery.
• Combining the information collected into one database (the CSOR database).
• Using the CSOR database to describe the health and wellbeing of children who have had early surgery in different hospitals across the UK and Ireland
• Using information from the CSOR database to create a platform which allows hospitals to compare the health and wellbeing of children who have undergone early surgery with them against the health and wellbeing of children who have undergone early surgery in other hospitals.
• Using information from the CSOR database to create a platform which provides parents with accurate information about the health and wellbeing of children who have undergone early surgery in different hospitals
• Using information from the CSOR database to create a 'facilitated feedback model' to help hospitals understand where their practice varies from other hospitals and how this may affect the health and wellbeing of children that have had early surgery with them

Which conditions will CSOR include?

Read more about which conditions CSOR will include on the Conditions page