The North Node Privacy Advisory Committee's (NNPAC) streamlined process is for research that is led by University of Aberdeen or NHS Grampian staff, uses only DaSH ethically approved NHS Grampian datasets and does not have a commercial partner. This single application process encompasses reviews from the Research Governance Team (Sponsor), NHS Ethics, NHSG R&D permission and the NHSG Caldicott Guardian.
Early in your project planning you should contact DaSH to discuss your data and data management requirements and suitability for NNPAC review.
Please note, if you require datasets not covered by NNPAC, all researchers – including those affiliated with the University of Aberdeen (UOA) and NHS Grampian (NHSG) – will need to follow the Full Permissions Pathway. However, if there are datasets you require that are held locally by NHS Grampian, DaSH may be able to amend its Ethics to cover those datasets and your project may be eligible for NNPAC. This should be discussed with DaSH in your initial meeting (see below).
- For datasets originating solely from NHS Grampian, you can follow the Full (Local) Permission Pathway here.
- For datasets originating from more than one Health Board in Scotland, you can follow the Full (National) Permission Pathway. This pathway is currently under development and will be available on our DaSH website very soon.
To help you navigate the NNPAC permission pathway and its submission requirements, we have developed a comprehensive step-by-step guide and checklist. You can find them in the download section at the top of this webpage. For a quick visual summary, check out the flowchart below.
