The AIHW has identified an ongoing need to review, refine and assess how chronic conditions should be monitored generally and what is measurable across the spectrum of risk factors, incidence/prevalence, health care (primary health care and hospitalisation), co-morbidities, functional limitation/disability, burden of disease, mortality and expenditure. The first step in this process is to determine which conditions should be monitored, and in what context.

This working paper summarises an approach by the AIHW NCMCC to define and select chronic conditions for collective monitoring in Australia with greater transparency. The aim of this approach is to improve consistency and provide guiding principles for the definition of chronic conditions for collective monitoring and thereby improving national statistics for health policy, planning and research.

This approach is supported by national and international evidence and, with the assistance of worked case study examples, may form a useful reference for other organisations in making similar decisions regarding the collective analysis and reporting of chronic conditions.