Since data analytics and biological knowledge are both necessary for cancer treatment, and since data scientists and oncologists generally lack expertise in each other's fields, it is crucial that they collaborate to advance treatment and enhance understanding of patients and diseases.
In a new article for STAT, Stephanie Birkey Reffey, PhD, and Jerome Jourquin, PhD, heads of Susan G. Komen's Big Data for Breast Cancer initiative, detail how integrating big data — from electronic health records, claims databases, genomic information and more — will expand research and clinical capabilities, and how bridging the gap between data scientists and physicians and researchers will unlock the many potential benefits of data use in medicine.
Big Data for Breast Cancer, for example, is "creating opportunities for cancer researchers and data scientists to become familiar with each other's field, fostering strong collaborations and ultimately creating a new 'bilingual' workforce populated with individuals who understand breast cancer risks, onset and progression and can apply data science methods to answer the challenges faced by breast cancer patients," Dr. Reffey and Dr. Jourquin wrote.
These opportunities include scholarships for breast cancer researchers to attend data science conferences or workshops, where they can learn more about using big data and meet potential collaborators. The initiative also addresses pressing issues such as encouraging patients to share their data with researchers and engaging those patients in research and clinical care, and exploring how data science can predict responses to treatment and outcomes.
This and other initiatives, they wrote, "will pave the way for doctors to provide patients with any type of cancer with individually tailored risks and benefits of various treatment options — including their likelihood of responding and of experiencing side effects — to inform decision-making and deliver the best results for each patient. Big data is one more tool for making that future a reality."
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