"Stories are information too"

HSJ (2 August) featured an interview with Mark Davies, NHS Information Centre, where he talks about the value of stories (from patients, carers, staff) in understanding current systems and designing improvements:  "Stories are information too".  There's a lot in the KM literature about story telling as a way of capturing and sharing experiential knowledge and learning lessons (some links below).

Mark Davies talks more widely about the critical value of information in making evidence-based decisions, giving an example of analysis in Slough where geosocial mapping enabled teams to target areas where they suspected high numbers of patients with undiagnosed diabetes - within 6 weeks, the number of diagnosed patients increased by 285%.

He goes on to say "We have lots of data but it's lazy data.  We have to make it work and turn it into actionable data - data we can do something with".

A few more resources on the value of story-telling:

• Healthtalkonline - http://www.healthtalkonline.org/ and its sister site, youthhealthtalk.org, share the experiences of over 2000 people's experiences of around 60 health-related conditions and illnesses.
• David Gurteen writes and speaks a lot about the value of conversation and story-telling - this blog post is one example http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen.nsf/id/business-is-a-conversation-post.  More insights at http://www.gurteen.com/.
• Department of Work and Pensions http://www.ikmagazine.com/xq/asp/txtSearch.learning/exactphrase.1/sid.0/articleid.CC54EE1E-55AC-4C65-9860-770D217540C9/qx/display.htm