Power BI Public Health Dashboard Reporting Training Course

Course overview

Public health teams need to turn fragmented surveillance, service-use, immunisation, workforce and population datasets into reporting that supports timely action. Static spreadsheets and manually assembled monthly packs make it difficult to identify widening inequalities, monitor outbreaks, compare local areas fairly, or explain performance to commissioners and senior leaders. This intermediate course focuses on building trusted Power BI dashboards that make public health indicators clear, traceable and usable without exposing sensitive data or misleading decision-makers.

Participants learn to connect and profile public health data, clean and reshape extracts with Power Query, design a star-schema data model, and write DAX measures for rates, rolling periods, targets, demographic breakdowns and geographic comparisons. The course addresses denominator management, suppression-aware reporting, data-quality flags, accessibility, row-level security and dashboard design for audiences ranging from analysts to directors. Participants also practise publishing, refreshing and governing reports in the Power BI Service.

Teaching combines instructor demonstrations with guided builds using realistic public health reporting scenarios, including screening uptake, vaccination coverage, emergency admissions and health inequalities indicators. Each participant develops a publishable dashboard pack containing a data model, documented measures, interactive report pages, quality checks and an implementation plan for their own reporting environment. The course closes with a structured peer review against a public health dashboard checklist.

The programme is suited to analysts and reporting professionals who already use spreadsheets or basic Power BI and now need to create reliable, decision-ready reporting for public health, health protection, community services or integrated care.

Course objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Build a Power BI star-schema model for linked population, activity, geography and demographic datasets
• Transform public health extracts with Power Query using profiling, data types, merges, append queries and reusable parameters
• Write DAX measures for crude rates, age-standardised rate inputs, rolling 12-month totals, targets and year-on-year change
• Create suppression-aware visualisations that distinguish small numbers, missing values, zero values and data-quality exceptions
• Design interactive dashboard pages using drill-through, tooltips, bookmarks, field parameters and accessible visual layouts
• Apply row-level security roles and workspace permissions to control access to sensitive health and social care data
• Publish and schedule a governed Power BI Service report with refresh settings, endorsement and usage monitoring
• Produce a dashboard specification and indicator dictionary that document definitions, sources, denominators and limitations

Benefits of attending

Target competencies

Who should attend

• Public Health Analysts — who need to convert surveillance and population-health data into decision-ready dashboards
• Business Intelligence Analysts — who build reporting products for public health, community and prevention services
• Population Health Managers — who need consistent views of outcomes, inequalities, demand and intervention performance
• Health Intelligence Officers — who prepare local-area indicators and evidence for commissioners and partnership boards
• Integrated Care System Reporting Staff — who combine activity, demographic and place-based data across organisations
• Health Protection and Screening Coordinators — who monitor coverage, uptake, timeliness and exception patterns

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should be comfortable working with structured tables in Excel or CSV files and understand basic reporting concepts such as measures, dimensions, filters, percentages and rates. Prior use of Power BI Desktop is helpful: attendees should be able to import a file, create a simple chart and navigate the report canvas. Familiarity with public health indicators, population denominators, geography codes or NHS data is useful but not essential. The course teaches Power Query, data modelling, DAX and Power BI Service practices from an intermediate starting point. No programming, advanced statistics, SQL, R or prior dashboard design qualification is required.

Training methodology

The course is delivered through instructor-led demonstrations, short technical briefings and sustained hands-on Power BI builds. Participants work with realistic public health datasets containing population denominators, service activity, geography and demographic fields, then apply each method in Power BI Desktop and the Power BI Service. Case discussions examine misleading rates, small-number suppression and unequal outcomes. Small-group dashboard critiques focus on usability for commissioners and operational leads. On day five, each participant adapts the course approach into a practical dashboard implementation plan for a live reporting need.

Course outline

Day 1: Public health reporting architecture in Power BI

• Public health reporting questions, audiences and decision pathways
• Indicator definitions, numerators, denominators and reporting periods
• Power BI Desktop interface, storage modes and report structure
• Importing Excel, CSV and folder-based public health data extracts
• Data profiling and quality checks in Power Query
• Cleaning geography, demographic and date fields
• Designing a public health dashboard specification and indicator dictionary

Workshop: Build a reporting specification and import a multi-table vaccination coverage dataset, producing an initial data-quality log.

Day 2: Data transformation and robust modelling

• Power Query query steps, applied-step auditing and error handling
• Merge, append, pivot and unpivot transformations for activity data
• Parameters and reusable functions for periodic data refreshes
• Star-schema design for fact tables, dimensions and lookup tables
• Date tables, fiscal periods and rolling reporting calendars
• Relationships, filter direction and ambiguous relationship diagnosis
• Model documentation using table descriptions and field naming standards

Workshop: Transform monthly screening and population extracts into a documented star-schema model with a validated date dimension.

Day 3: DAX measures for population health indicators

• DAX evaluation context and the role of filter context
• Base measures for counts, distinct people and valid records
• Rate and percentage calculations using population denominators
• Rolling 12-month, year-to-date and prior-period measures
• Target, variance and trajectory measures for performance monitoring
• Demographic and geographic comparison measures
• Handling blanks, zeros, missing denominators and data-quality flags in DAX

Workshop: Create and test a measure library for uptake, rates, rolling trends and target variance, then validate outputs against a supplied control table.

Day 4: Dashboard design, inequality analysis and safe disclosure

• Selecting visuals for trends, maps, distributions and equity gaps
• Accessible colour, labels, alt text and keyboard-aware report design
• Drill-through pages, report tooltips, bookmarks and navigation controls
• Field parameters for user-selected measures and breakdowns
• Small-number suppression and disclosure-control presentation rules
• Reference lines, targets and statistical interpretation cautions
• Dashboard review criteria for directors, commissioners and operational teams

Workshop: Design a three-page health inequalities dashboard with geography drill-through, demographic comparisons and suppression-aware display rules.

Day 5: Publishing, security and operational adoption

• Publishing reports, semantic models and apps in Power BI Service
• Workspace roles, sharing permissions and managed audience access
• Row-level security design for locality and service-level access
• Scheduled refresh, gateway concepts and refresh-failure monitoring
• Endorsement, lineage, sensitivity labels and report governance
• Usage metrics and feedback loops for dashboard improvement
• Implementation planning for a live public health reporting product

Workshop: Publish a governed dashboard pack, configure a sample security role, and produce a 90-day implementation plan covering ownership, refresh, review and stakeholder rollout.

Tools & standards covered

Microsoft Power BI Desktop, Microsoft Power BI Service, Microsoft Power Query, DAX

A typical training day

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in the East Africa Time zone, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

How you can take this course

Certification

Participants who complete the full five days receive the Skillset Development Certificate of Completion, stating the course title, course code, dates and delivery format — suitable for professional-development records and employer reimbursement.

Frequently asked questions