Clinical Research Informatics Program
Heather Lyu, M.D., M.B.I.
Program Director
- Departments, Labs and Institutes
- Research Centers and Programs
- Clinical Research Informatics Program
We empower researchers and clinicians with the best data and informatics solutions to deliver excellent care and make transformative advancements in the field of cancer surgery.
We empower researchers and clinicians with the best data and informatics solutions to deliver excellent care and make transformative advancements in the field of cancer surgery.
Efficient data collection, management and analyses in health care are essential to improve patient outcomes, support evidence-based decision making and inform robust clinical and translational research. We unify and streamline data collection to ensure the efficient tracking of patient outcomes, participation in clinical trials and collaboration among other researchers in the institution as well as external collaborators. We also aid with our researchers’ compliance with regulatory requirements to increase the transparency of our data collection and analytic methods.
Key functions and responsibilities of the program include the following:
- Data Integration: Help integrate and organize existing clinical databases; key data components common to all disease sites are integrated to create a central repository for patient and provider level data used for research
- Data Extraction: Support automated data extraction from our enterprise data warehouses and other departmental and institutional databases
- Enhanced Data Entry: Standardize data elements and structure clinical variables through the Department of Surgical Oncology Automated Cancer Data Initiative (ACDI); the goal is to automate the collection of key structured oncologic variables
- Data Analytics: Assist researchers in data wrangling and big data analyses (machine learning, natural language processing) for research proposals and grants
Members
Under the leadership of Heather Lyu, M.D., M.B.I, the program will become a hub for data scientists, engineers and clinicians to work together as a team to collect better data and incorporate informatics approaches to research methodologies.
Opportunities
There have been many exciting advancements in clinical data science and artificial intelligence. Collaboration among clinicians and informaticians presents numerous opportunities to advance cancer care and research.
Current collaborations
We currently collaborate with researchers at:
Our clinical research informatics program is critical in advancing data capabilities and serves as the technological and data driven backbone of our research initiatives. The standardization of data elements, automation of data extraction, facilitation of data sharing and real-time data access are all important and necessary advancements to optimize patient care and research practices.
Heather Lyu, M.D.
Program Director