Harnessing collaboration: Accelerating medical breakthroughs with quality data
Why enhancing data quality is key to increasing the velocity and value of health insights – the role of secure data collaboration platforms in improving outcomes.
Through the years, many industries have shied away from efforts to enhance data quality because of how time-consuming the process can be – and several industries, like healthcare, cannot afford to hinder the speed of work.
The response to the COVID-19 pandemic upended this assumption, as researchers across the globe scrambled towards a solution for containing the virus. The first coronavirus vaccine came to market in record time because the industry prioritized accuracy, speed and collaboration.
When considering methods for increasing the ability and speed for deriving actionable insights from health data, the expression, “Two heads are better than one,” comes to mind. By enabling stakeholders within healthcare to securely collaborate on wider pools of real-world patient data, they can be enabled to build off one another’s findings and ultimately accelerate the pace of medical breakthroughs.
Driving data quality
Collaboration between multiple factions of the healthcare industry for the sake of medical advancement is not a brand-new concept.
However, it was truly not until the COVID-19 pandemic that global researchers, governments and health systems came together in a race to discover a solution to contain the virus. The first vaccine came to market in record time, with an eleven-month timespan between development, testing and emergency use authorization.
The unprecedented speed can be attributed to one key factor: the majority of stakeholders across healthcare – from hospitals to research centers, life science companies and government agencies – all collected, shared and partnered on the same pool of high-quality data. This collaborative approach based on quality and speed will enable medical breakthroughs that deliver meaningful patient outcomes.
An example of how cross-functional collaboration can make all the difference is a recent MITRE-led research consortium that united real-world patient data from four health systems in California, Minnesota, Texas and Utah. Utilizing a secure data collaboration platform, researchers established a pipeline that captured and analyzed data from patients with COVID-19 across each organization.
The access to this information supported a more comprehensive understanding of the efficacy of a treatment that neutralized monoclonal antibodies in patients. By collaborating around accurate and relevant data, the researchers were able to generate faster insights that impacted patient outcomes.
Accelerating breakthroughs
There is no shortage of healthcare data available to researchers, with one-third of all data generated in the world related to wellness and healthcare. In fact, healthcare has a projected data growth rate of more than 30 percent year over year, which is more than any other industry.
However, the availability of data from various sources, such as remote monitoring tools and wearables, is creating unique challenges. The healthcare industry is struggling to keep up with an overabundance of data, making it difficult to decide which data should be analyzed and how those insights can be applied to patient care.
Additionally, health data is frequently siloed across incompatible technologies and systems, which can make it even more challenging for physicians to see the “big picture” of the data and how those insights can be used to improve patient care.
Secure data collaboration platforms are helping providers sort through the surplus of available health data, so they can determine which clinical research data is most valuable and relevant to their practice area. The collaborative nature of these platforms enables physicians to review clinical research data through their own lens, enabling them to extract and apply data insights to patient care or their own research. Clinicians are also empowered to support the advancement of research by using the platforms to disclose their own insights and findings involving shared data.
Better using real-world data
In healthcare, we are constantly facing the need to deliver lifesaving care to patients. This care begins with research, and it is time we fully embrace the power of collaboration as a catalyst for speed in healthcare.
True advancements in human health should not be uncovered in the confines of a secluded laboratory but should be shaped by the ecosystems created by patients, clinicians, and researchers that choose to work together to magnify the value of health data.
There are several key learnings from COVID-19 research that should be applied in future work, but the most impactful is the power of collaboration.
Reverting to the status quo of siloed research would be a grave step backward and we must continue to push to make collaboration the industry standard. The value of high-quality data only increases the more it is shared and leveraged to generate new insights, so the impact of ongoing collaboration in achieving breakthroughs and driving lifesaving treatments for patients as quickly as possible would be even more immense. We saw the impact of collaboration on treating COVID-19, so imagine the influence we can have on transforming other areas of healthcare.
James Kugler is CEO of EMD Digital and Director of Syntropy.