by Angela Guess

A new press release states, “Globally recognized leaders in technology, bioethics, genomics, oncology and patient advocacy – convened by the Susan G. Komen breast cancer organization – are gathering here today to drive breast cancer research and improve treatment through the power of Big Data. Komen’s Big Data for Breast Cancer – West Coast conference is the second symposium convened by the breast cancer organization in hopes of channeling Big Data into better breast cancer care. ‘We are working for multidisciplinary collaborations that can help us apply Big Data to improve breast cancer treatment and outcomes,’ said Komen Chief Scientific Advisor Dr. George Sledge of Stanford University. ‘Together, we plan to identify opportunities to work together on the very promising but complicated use of Big Data’.”

The release goes on, “Big Data applications could lead to greater opportunities and ways to improve the focus and, hopefully, speed of research in finding answers to improve how patients feel, function and survive. The symposium brings together experts in oncology research, genomics, bioethics, patient advocacy and Big Data analytics, and is funded with generous support from the Robertson Foundation. Attendees hope the symposium brings to light some challenges that exist in advancing the role of Big Data in breast cancer research and care as well as ways to pivot existing technology to address these challenges.”

Dr. Amy Abernethy, Chief Medical Officer and Senior Vice President of Oncology at Flatiron Health, commented, “We can use Big Data to collect information from sources such as electronic health records to answer complicated questions about the efficacy and safety of drug combinations, to understand how effective drugs are approved by the FDA, and much more. But oncology data is complex, so in order to derive insights from these large data sets, we need robust infrastructure and data quality standards’.”

Read more at Business Wire.

Photo credit: Susan G. Comen