This course introduces the essential spreadsheet skills needed to record, organise and prepare health-related data for research and analysis. Good data practices often begin long before advanced bioinformatics, statistics or big data tools are used, and for many life scientists and healthcare professionals, that starting point is Excel.
Designed for beginners or for those who already use Excel but want to work more effectively, the course will help you understand core spreadsheet concepts, apply practical tools to your own data, and recognise common formatting and organisation issues that can affect later analysis. You will also explore good data entry practices, basic quality control, data manipulation and approaches for handling dates and metadata.
By the end of the course, you will be more confident using Excel to support your work or research, while also understanding its limitations and knowing when a different tool may be more appropriate. The aim is to help you build cleaner, more reliable and better-structured datasets that can support stronger health-related questions, analysis and decision-making.
