Fraunhofer Institute for Software and Systems Engineering
Fraunhofer Institute for Software and Systems Engineering

Comprehensive IT strategy for UK-RUB

Healtcare Content Management Software (HCMS) for Bochum University Hospital

As one of the largest university hospitals in Germany with eight sponsors and over 600,000 treatments annually, the University Hospital of the Ruhr University Bochum (UK RUB) has enormous potential for data-driven clinical research. Therefore, under the leadership of the Faculty of Medicine of the RUB, the responsible bodies of the UK RUB are striving for a cooperative research data management within the framework of a joint IT umbrella strategy in order to strengthen research and teaching through structured and interoperable data preparation and provision.

The challenge

After patients have given their consent, the providers of the UK RUB make pseudonymized care and research data available to the central data platform at the Faculty of Medicine of the Ruhr University Bochum via local data management systems (LDM) in accordance with the core data set (KDS) of the Medical Informatics Initiative (MII) by means of a trust office (THS). The so-called central data management system at the Faculty of Medicine brings these data together and enables their use for national and international research projects in compliance with data protection regulations. The implementation of the project is based on the nationally developed documents of the MII and on the elaborations of the SMITH consortium, of which the Faculty of Medicine is a member. The total project duration is 15 months and begins with the analysis of the existing data situation at each individual carrier hospital in order to migrate the existing systems and data to the LDM. Interfaces to the ZDM are then created through the THS to enable cross-carrier data exchange through the ZDM. Among other things, this structure serves to realize the data integration center at the RUB Medical Faculty and thus to connect to the MII.

 

Our contribution

Fraunhofer ISST has been part of the SMITH consortium for 5 years and is thus involved in the development and setup of the MII. Thus, we contribute extensive expertise and tools for the coordination of cross-site data sharing. In the project, we will take the lead in implementing the interfaces between LDM and ZDM, as well as to THS and data sharing. We will also contribute our knowledge of the technical and organizational implementation options for data sharing and data analysis in the MII to the project. 

 

Results

The overall project goal is the creation of a common research data infrastructure in order to promote competitive, high-quality and quantitative research, teaching and patient care within the UK RUB and to implement it in the long term.

 

Partners

  • EY und EY-Parthenon
  • vitagroup