Longitudinal wellbeing of veterans and families

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Project and purpose

The Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide has recognised that due to the nature of military service, veterans may experience greater risks detrimental to their long-term wellbeing; highlighting a need to better support the wellbeing of veterans across their lifespan. To do that, a better understanding about different veteran cohorts is needed. 

In 2022, DVA established a project with the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) called ‘Longitudinal wellbeing of veterans and their families’ (Longitudinal Wellbeing Project) using data from the ABS Person Level Integrated Data Asset (PLIDA). DVA is building on the existing ‘Longitudinal Wellbeing Project’ by linking DVA data to ABS PLIDA data, to support the development of more holistic understanding of wellbeing outcomes and service usage for ex-serving members and their families.

By linking DVA data to ABS PLIDA data, DVA can undertake analysis to better understand the health and wellbeing outcomes of ADF members after they transition from the ADF to civilian life, and how the utilisation of DVA services impacts on those outcomes.

DVA recognises that personal life experiences, social and other health and wellbeing determinants may contribute to an individual’s quality of life, including areas such as income, finance, employment, education, skills, housing, social support, connection, spirituality and meaning, and recognition and respect.

The ‘Longitudinal Wellbeing Project’ will analyse DVA and ABS PLIDA data to investigate the research question, ‘What is the wellbeing and service usage of ex-serving members and their families in Australia as reflected in DVA and ABS PLIDA data?’.

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Why we are linking DVA data? 

The Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide Final report has emphasised the importance of data and research to support analysis of veteran wellbeing. 

DVA and ABS PLIDA data both present unique information, which side by side can support the better understanding of the wellbeing needs of ex-serving members and their families:

• DVA has information on its programs, policies, and services that other government departments (e.g. Medicare) may not cover or reach.
• ABS PLIDA contains data not necessarily captured by DVA (e.g. employment, health, housing, education, and income data). 

There is an opportunity to explore the wellbeing and service usage of ex-serving members and families at a cohort level, using DVA data linked with ABS PLIDA data. 

Enhanced veteran data will enable targeted policy, and programs to be developed by DVA, better meeting the wellbeing needs of veterans and families.

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What is PLIDA?

PLIDA (Person Level Integrated Data Asset) is a secure data system managed by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). It combines information from multiple Commonwealth agencies on health, education, government payments, income, employment, and demographics (including Census) over time.

It provides whole-of-life insights about various population groups in Australia, such as the interactions between their characteristics, use of services like healthcare and education, and outcomes like improved health and employment.

Please see the ABS website for more information on PLIDA.

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Key outputs of the study?

Key project insights are intended to inform evidence-based policy, program, and service design by DVA, and support the identification of opportunities for early interventions. 

The outputs of this study will be cohort-level summaries that provide insights on the wellbeing characteristics of ex-serving members and their families.

Gaining a deeper understanding of the wellbeing needs of ex‐serving members will allow DVA to deliver benefits to those in the veteran community, as recognised by the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide.

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How this research aligns to existing research and priorities?

The Australian public expects that veterans and veteran families will be supported after service.

Veteran research plays a vital role in ensuring the wellbeing of Australia’s veterans and families.

DVA takes a proactive approach in commissioning research to build an evidence base that supports the health and wellbeing needs of Australia’s veterans and families, including the use of non-DVA data. 

This project complements existing research projects with key research partners such as the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, the Australian Institute of Family Studies, Defence and the international Five Eyes Veteran Research Committee, and existing funded partnerships with research institutions. This study also aligns to recommendations out of inquiries such as the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide, the National Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide Prevention and the Productivity Commission Inquiry Report, A Better Way to Support Veterans.

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Benefits of the study to the veteran and wider communities

Gaining a deeper understanding of the wellbeing needs of ex-serving members will allow DVA to deliver benefits to both DVA clients and the wider ex-serving member community. 

Insight papers may support DVA to:

• Maximise recovery from illness, injury, and harm. Better understanding of how individuals are engaging with DVA services over their lifetime can support the design of targeted interventions at critical life stages.
• Support successful transition into civilian life. A deeper understanding of the transition period can support more effective interventions.
• Deliver community benefits to other entities such as: 
  • Organisations supporting current and ex-serving members (such as Defence, and ex-service organisations) may benefit from the research by having access to findings and factsheets.
  • Health and welfare providers may be able to gain a better understanding about opportunities for improvement for the services they provide veterans including mental health services.

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Does PLIDA include personal information?

Personal information is used for linkage purposes to produce the integrated data for analysis. Personal information is not available to the project researchers. Information used for analysis is de-identified; this means that identifying information such as name and address are removed or altered into an unidentifiable form. The de-identified analytical data are the data used by authorised project researchers. 

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Personal information relating to DVA clients to be disclosed to the ABS

The ABS is trusted as the accredited Integrating Authority for PLIDA. ABS collects and combines the data, provides access to authorised researchers, and protects your privacy and keeps your information secure at all times.

DVA will disclose two types of data sets to the ABS: data for linkage, and data for analysis. Consistent with the approach ABS takes to integrate data into PLIDA, ABS will apply the ‘Separation Principle’ so that identifiable personal information (data for linkage) is transferred, stored, and handled separately from other analytical data in the PLIDA with restricted access to both sets of information.

1. DVA data for linkage: which includes personal information such as name and address. 
   • Personal information is only used to enable datasets to be linked to the PLIDA spine data.
   • Direct identifiers are removed, and potentially identifiable information is transformed once linkage has occurred. 
2. DVA data for analysis: which does not contain personal identifiers, but it does include de-identified information for analysis. 
   • This information is only available to the specified project researchers in the ABS DataLab. 
   • DVA data that assists in describing key veteran groups and/or answering research questions will be included within this data set, such as:
     • Information that supports classification into veteran groups e.g. DVA clients who participate or have participated in a specific DVA program or service.
     • Injury and claims-related data such as count of initial liability claims lodged and injury information as this is not available in ABS PLIDA. Your clinical records will not be shared, only a summarised version of injury information will be used. 
     • DVA Service usage data such as veteran card type, and count of DVA services used as this complements non-DVA service usage data available in ABS PLIDA.

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How your personal information will be protected

Data governance of this study is based on the Five Safes Framework. Please refer to the ABS website for more details on how the ABS manages data confidentiality risks through the Five Safes Framework. 

The Five Safe Framework outlines strategies for managing data privacy and security risks in researching, analysing, and presenting data and includes safe projects, safe people, safe settings, safe data, and safe outputs.

The Framework ensures the research has value and poses minimal risk, the data analysts are reliable, the research operational environment is secure, the data are appropriately protected, and the results and insights obtained from the data do not identify individuals or disclose sensitive information.

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DVA’s privacy policy and data used for research projects

DVA provides data for research to support the health and wellbeing needs of veterans and their families and identify emerging issues facing the veteran community. Research is an important part of developing effective departmental policy, shaping service delivery responses, and evaluating DVA programs and pilots.

Research proposals that relate to veterans are reviewed by the Departments of Defence and Veterans' Affairs Human Research Ethics Committee (DDVA HREC) for ethical approval, which includes an assessment of the privacy implications of each proposal.

In most cases, research uses ‘de-identified data,’ rather than personal information. Under the Privacy Act 1988 (the Privacy Act), personal information is considered de-identified if the information is no longer about someone who can be identified.

However, in certain circumstances, Section 95 of the Privacy Act 1988 permits the handling of personal information, including health information for health and medical research purposes, where it is not practical for researchers to obtain individuals' consent. 

Researchers must follow certain guidelines when handling health information for this type of research purpose. These guidelines, which were approved by Australia’s Privacy Commissioner and issued by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC), also assist Human Research Ethics Committees (HRECs) in deciding whether to approve this type of research application. 

For this research project, a waiver of consent through Section 95 of the Privacy Act has been approved by the DDVA HREC. 

Please go to DVA Research and Privacy - Department of Veterans' Affairs for more information about DVA Research and Privacy.

Please go to DVA Privacy Policy | Department of Veterans' Affairs for more information on DVA’s privacy policy.

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For this project, what happens when you request to be excluded from research

For this research project, a waiver of consent under Section 95 of the Privacy Act has been granted by the DDVA HREC. Guidelines under Section 95 of the Privacy Act 1988, provide a framework in which medical research involving personal information obtained by Commonwealth agencies should be conducted, to ensure the information is protected against unauthorised collection or disclosure.

The guidelines help HRECs to weigh up public interest in protecting privacy against public interest in the conduct of medical research and the important role of health and medical research in advancing public health, when making decisions about research applications.

If you apply to DVA for your personal information to be excluded from research, DVA will apply your preference to exclude your DVA data from this research project. Veterans who have already requested for their data to be removed from the MATES program, or who have opted out previously from public research will be automatically removed from the data transfer unless otherwise instructed by the individual veterans. 

Please contact privacy.enquiries@dva.gov.au if you would like to apply to be excluded from research.

Due to processing requirements to action the request to be excluded, the cut-off date for the initial transfer will be 11 May 2025. 

Subsequent requests will be actioned on an annual basis as DVA will provide annual updates of data to the ABS. Once transferred and linked, it is not possible to exclude a person from the analytical data set as it is a de-identified data set. 

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For this project, what data can’t be changed even if you request to be excluded from research

Any insights released from the ABS environment that have been generated by a linked de-identified dataset that contains your data (prior to your request to be excluded) cannot be changed as these insights are de-identified. De-identified data sets (created prior to your request to be excluded) also cannot be changed as your personal information is not identifiable within the data sets. Your request to be excluded from DVA research will apply to your DVA data for the PLIDA dataset. It cannot be applied to any of your data from other agencies that is already in the PLIDA dataset.

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How to request for further information

Please contact generalenquiries@dva.gov.au if you have any questions or concerns about this research.

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