Health Data Immersion Week (March 2023) - 
Working with Real-World Data

PIONEER improves patient care by making routinely-collected health data available to doctors, researchers and academics, under licence. With robust governance and ethics in place, this data can then be used to develop new methods of predicting, diagnosing and monitoring illness in hospital and at home; improving treatment choice and identifying new ways of delivering clinical care.

Working with University Hospitals Birmingham, through the HDR UK supported PIONEER Data Hub, this course will give participants from across the UK an insight into the potential and challenges of real-world health data, and practical experience of working with health data. It will highlight the significant data engineering efforts that underlie the provision of research-ready data and the use of a modern secure computing environment that is the emerging standard for accessing UK health data. 

Upon completion of this course, you will:

• Be able to define the primary and secondary use of health data
• Have increased your understanding of the governance and data legislation which underpin access to unconsented health data 
• Be able to describe the national data opt out and how this is applied to unconsented health data  
• Be aware of the benefits and limitations of real-world health data  
• Be aware of the continuum from identifiable to pseudonymised to anonymised health data, and practice making a dataset anonymised
• Be familiar with data cleaning and data QA/QC when provided with access to real world health data  
• Have conducted a statistical analysis of real-world health data, answering a clinical question, with support from clinical experts  
• Have explored common data models such as OMOP, to understand their benefits and limitations
• Gain experience of using a secure computing environment 

This course will combine guided practicals and lectures from experts in health, data, research and governance from both the University of Birmingham and University Hospitals Birmingham. 

Via PIONEER’S Trusted Research Environment, you will have access to an EHR Synthetic data set developed specifically for this programme and configured to offer a snapshot of clinical practice. 

You will also submit a data cleansing and a data analysis exercise for review and receive feedback on your work.

This course is suitable for candidates who: 

• Have a first degree in a quantitative discipline 
• Are currently enrolled in a programme of advanced study (e.g. PhD or MRes), or have equivalent professional experience
• Have experience of programming in Python or R  
• Have little or no prior experience in working with electronic health record data and systems 

Dinner will be provided on one of the evenings, and a light lunch and refreshments all week, but you will be expected to arrange and fund all other meals, travel and accommodation.  

Applications closed on Sunday 05 March.