The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has released a new module in the HCUP Online Tutorial Series. The course entitled Trend Analysis examines errors in study results that may occur when combining two or more HCUP years of data, and presents solutions for conducting analyses that span multiple HCUP data years. The course presents examples and solutions using the Nationwide Inpatient Sample (NIS) and Kids' Inpatient Database (KID). Some issues described are also relevant to other HCUP databases.

The HCUP Online Tutorial Series is designed to provide data users with information about HCUP data and tools, as well as training on technical methods for conducting research using HCUP datasets. The series is available on the HCUP-US Website.