Looker Field Spotlight
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      Field Comparison: Client IDs

      This Looker Field Spotlight - Field Comparison compares the Client ID, Personal ID, and Unique Identifier and how they are utilized in the Clarity Data Analytics Tool.

      When creating content in Looker, you will inevitably run into the Client ID, Personal ID, and Unique ID fields in nearly every model in the Clients Views. This article describes what the Client ID, Personal ID, and Unique ID fields represent, where to find them in the Clarity Human Services user interface, and how to use those fields to create content for your community. 

      Looker Fields

      • Client ID: The Client ID is the ID of the individual client record in Clarity Human Services. This is applied to each record sequentially (i.e., Client ID = 1 is the first record added to the Clarity system for the instance). 
      • Personal ID: The Personal ID is a 32-character string used for deduplication as required by HUD’s HMIS Data Standards (Data Element# 5.08). A single Personal ID can be connected to multiple client records if the system's automatic deduplication process (or a system administrator using the Link tool) identifies that the records are associated with the same client. To learn more about Personal ID and the related matching algorithm, please review our Personal ID article.
      • Unique Identifier: The Unique Identifier is the Clarity-generated unique identifier and is a unique string for each client in the alpha-numeric format. 

      Clarity Crosswalk

      • Client ID: Client ID was previously utilized for the Clarity URL.
        Client ID can still be used when within the URL as there are redirects in place.
        https://www.[instancename].clarityhs.com/client/[Client ID OR Unique Identifier]/profile

        This field is used as a primary key within the clarity_clients data table and can be utilized when generating queries in the Customer SQL model, as it is associated with ref_client as a foreign key in many tables to allow joins.

        ID 1

      A portion of the entity relationship diagram of the core HMIS tables available through the customer SQL model found on the Customer SQL Data Model article. 


      ID 2Join Example utilizing client.id from our gitlab repository.


      • Personal ID: Personal ID can be found by hovering on the information icon on the Client Profile underneath the Client Photo near the Unique Identifier display.

        ID 3
      • Unique Identifier: The Unique Identifier is displayed on the Client Profile under the Client Photo and the URL and is also supported in the Search functionality. 

      Sample Looks

      Comparing Counts

      The Look below is created as an example to represent expected differences with counts of Client ID, Unique Identifier, and Personal ID. 

      When analyzing counts of clients, Client ID and Unique Identifier will produce the same count of clients. Count of Personal ID will provide a deduplicated count of clients. 

      In this example, the HMIS Performance Model is used and the data returned identified 6,481 unduplicated clients (Count Personal IDs) enrolled during the last quarter with enrollments attached to 6,750 client profiles (Count Client IDs/Count of Unique Identifier). 

      ID 4

      Reviewing Potentially Duplicative Profiles 

      Creating the Look below will allow a community to review clients that have been identified as having more than one client profile based on the Personal ID algorithm and fuzzy matching. This Look is a great first step to start investigating potential duplicates and next steps. If clients are identified as being matched in ways that are not expected, System Administrators can manually unlink these profiles by generating a new Personal ID for the client. To learn more about manually linking/unlinking clients from a Personal ID, refer to our article on the Link/Unlink Tool. 

      ID 6

      Model: Client Model 

      Filters:

      • Dimension
        • Clients – Deleted: is No
      • Measure
        • Clients – Count Client IDs: is >1

      Dimension:

      • Clients - Personal ID

      Measures:

      • Clients – Count Client IDs
      • Custom Measure 
        • List of Unique Identifier
          • Create a custom measure by selecting the kebab icon, then selecting aggregate then list of unique values

      ID 5

      Expanding the Look

      The fields used in the deduplication algorithms are: 

      • Client Name
      • Name Data Quality
      • SSN
      • SSN Data Quality
      • Date of Birth
      • Date of Birth Data Quality
      • Race and Ethnicity
      • Gender 
      • Veteran Status 

      These dimensions can be added to the Look for additional review. 



      Published: 05/28/2024