"Follow a structure!!" - Twey

Firstly, there's absolutely no reason for you to fail one of these stations, they are so incredibly straight-forward once you follow this structure, it's almost laughable.

Step 1 - What is the data about?

1. Read the title, what is the graph/table about? Read it out loud.

2. Read the source (if stated). Where is this information coming from?

3. Glance at the graph/table and state what it is, is it a bar chart? Line chart?

4. Read the axes and name the units ("per 100,000 people")

5. Read any legends / captions accompanying the data

Step 2 - What is the general trend?

1. Take a step back and look at the general trend of the data, what is the general trend?

2. What could the reasons be for this trend? (i.e. "Alcohol-related deaths increased over 2008-2009, maybe due to possible economic instabilities as a result of the housing market crash" / "Reasons for this trend should be investigated to see if there's an association or causative factor")

3. Is this trend what you would have expected?

4. For excellent performance, comment on what could be done at a systemic / NHS-level to combat the trends (if they're negative), or support the trend (if the trend is contributing positively to health), i.e., "Continue public health education on the risks of alcohol dependency and promote support groups / charities"

Step 3 - Identify 'micro-trends'

1. Follow the 'general trend' but have a look for micro-trends. These are step-wise changes along the main data, for example, "from 2002 to 2004 there is a decrease in alcohol-related deaths, but then from 2004-2005 there was a transient increase in alcohol-related deaths, and then the decrease continued from 2005 onwards until 2008 when the increase in alcohol-related deaths is seen".

2. Comment on possible reasons for the existence of these micro-trends.

3. Mention how these micro-trends could be combatted / supported by initiatives that we could do within the NHS (see step 2, point 4)

Step 4 - Anomalies

1. Comment on any anomalies you see within the data, or trends / micro-trends that you didn't expect

2. Possible reasons for these anomalies?

3. Should this anomaly be considered within your conclusion of the meaning of the data?

4. What could be done differently to re-record this data, to test whether this result is an anomaly?

Step 5 - Conclude

1. Make an overall conclusion of this data ("In summary, this line chart shows... with a trend showing .... with micro-trends highlighting... with the exception of a possible anomaly within the year of ... "

2. Make an inference on the overall meaning of this data ("this highlights the importance of alcohol support services and..."

3. Relate this entire data to the importance of "Population health" and "Health data collection" within the NHS and the UK, "Measuring alcohol-related deaths ensures that we are able to measure the impact of socio-economic factors within the UK, and more importantly, measures the impact of our interventions to combat alcohol-related deaths, allowing the NHS to improve the alcohol-cessation services that it provides"

4. To show off even more, mention how you'd love to get involved with health data and population health during your work as a doctor, opting in to nationwide studies/data collection and possibly designing your own research to contribute to the overall data we have on the health of the country.

Go try some questions and make sure you follow this format until it's second nature.