Building Research Infrastructure to Develop Greater Learning Efficiencies (BRIDGE).

Summary

Researchers developed a Learning Health System at the Department of Veterans Affairs to integrate real-world oncology data into clinical decision-making. This infrastructure allows physicians to translate large-scale data analysis into personalized patient care by bridging the gap between informatics and bedside practice.

Key result

The BRIDGE framework implements a Learning Health System within the Department of Veterans Affairs to integrate real-world data repositories and algorithmic development into the clinical oncology workflow.

Abstract

In this manuscript, we outline our developed version of a Learning Health System (LHS) in oncology implemented at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Transferring healthcare into an LHS framework has been one of the spearpoints of VA's Central Office and given the general lack of evidence generated through randomized control clinical trials to guide medical decisions in oncology, this domain is one of the most suitable for this change. We describe our technical solution, which includes a large real-world data repository, a data science and algorithm development framework, and the mechanism by which results are brought back to the clinic and to the patient. Additionally, we propose the need for a bridging framework that requires collaboration between informatics specialists and medical professionals to integrate knowledge generation into the clinical workflow at the point of care.

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