Wednesday, 22 November 2023
Research from Nottingham University Business School is one step closer to helping to predict deaths from respiratory diseases by analysing the shopping habits of customers in local authority areas across England.
Newly published research in Nature Communications, funded by the UKRI/EPSRC, and supported by the NHS and a UK high street retailer, explored the connection between the purchase of non-prescription medications, from cough remedies to pain relief, that are used to treat respiratory illnesses, and registered deaths from those diseases.
Looking at over two billion records of sales from March 2016 to March 2020, supplied by the UK high street retailer, researchers at the University of Nottingham, led by Elizabeth Dolan and Dr James Goulding at NUBS, used Artificial Intelligence (AI) to predict the deaths in 314 local authority areas across England.
The team found that in using the shopping data from local authority areas, predictions were often a lot more accurate than models that relied primarily on seasonal trends and sociodemographic factors such as poverty, housing quality, age and the size of population.
Further to this, academics found that they could accurately predict deaths from respiratory diseases over 17 days in advance using the data they analysed.
Using these findings, it is hoped that future developments in this area could help identify those most at risk of death from respiratory conditions, support the NHS and help highlight the most at-risk communities and environmental changes that could exacerbate chronic lung conditions.
Elizabeth Dolan, a PhD candidate at the Horizon CDT and a member of Nottingham University Business School, said: "Our research shows that using sales data, such as rising cough medicine purchases, significantly improves predictions of deaths from respiratory disease. This highlights the urgent need to make this practical data source more accessible for medical research.
“It could provide healthcare providers an invaluable tool to better manage services and plan more effectively, especially as we now have COVID-19 to cope with alongside the other causes of respiratory disease.”
The full research paper is available here.
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More information is available from Elizabeth Dolan at Nottingham University Business School on elizabeth.dolan@nottingham.ac.uk
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About the University of Nottingham
Ranked 32 in Europe and 16th in the UK by the QS World University Rankings: Europe 2024, the University of Nottingham is a founding member of the Russell Group of research-intensive universities. Studying at the University of Nottingham is a life-changing experience, and we pride ourselves on unlocking the potential of our students. We have a pioneering spirit, expressed in the vision of our founder Sir Jesse Boot, which has seen us lead the way in establishing campuses in China and Malaysia - part of a globally connected network of education, research and industrial engagement.
Nottingham was crowned Sports University of the Year by The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2024 – the third time it has been given the honour since 2018 – and by the Daily Mail University Guide 2024.
The university is among the best universities in the UK for the strength of our research, positioned seventh for research power in the UK according to REF 2021. The birthplace of discoveries such as MRI and ibuprofen, our innovations transform lives and tackle global problems such as sustainable food supplies, ending modern slavery, developing greener transport, and reducing reliance on fossil fuels.
The university is a major employer and industry partner - locally and globally - and our graduates are the second most targeted by the UK's top employers, according to The Graduate Market in 2022 report by High Fliers Research.
We lead the Universities for Nottingham initiative, in partnership with Nottingham Trent University, a pioneering collaboration between the city’s two world-class institutions to improve levels of prosperity, opportunity, sustainability, health and wellbeing for residents in the city and region we are proud to call home.
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