HiGHmed - Medical Data Integration Center

Funding

The HiGHmed Project is funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research within the national initiative ”Medical Informatics” with 40 million euros (promotional referrence: 01ZZ1802C).

Summary

As part of the ”HiGHmed” funding project, a medical data integration center (MeDIC) is established at Hannover Medical School (MHH) in cooperation with several other university hospitals, the German Cancer Research Center and other partners in healthcare, science and industry. Various institutes and clinics of the MHH cooperate in the MeDIC, i.e. the Peter L. Reichertz Institute for Medical Informatics, the Center for Information Management (ZIMt), the Department of Cardiology and Angiology, the Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Endocrinology, the Institute for Diagnostic and Diagnostic Interventional Radiology, the Institute of Human Genetics, the Institute of Medical Microbiology and Hospital Hygiene and others.

Objectives
Primary objective of the MeDIC is the integration of multilocal, heterogeneous data within MHH to improve patient care and research. The strategic objective of HiGHmed is to establish an infrastructure based on internationally accepted, open standards for the cross-institutional exchange of medical data in the coming years to improve patient care and research opportunities in cooperation with the partners of the HiGHmed project. To achieve this goal, data must be interoperable in the participating institutions. The conditions and necessary measures for interoperability and interchangeability of the data are therefore coordinated across the institutions (common information management). To foster patient participation from the beginning, another goal is to establish an innovative patient portal so that patients can access their own data on the course of treatment as well as further information about their disease. Of course, data protection, data security as well as data privacy (informational self-determination) of the patients are of highest importance.

Use Cases and Advantages
The cross-institutional exchange of medical data is expected to improve patient care within three exemplary use cases:

• Use Case Oncology: Existing data sources, from e.g. radiology, pathology and electronic medical records should be merged within the technical platform of the MeDIC. To establish the cross-institutional exchange of data, the data have to be enriched semantically. A specific case for exchange of data is the consultation of specialists within a cross-institutional molecular tumor board meeting. Hereby, extensive data about treatment and progress of the disease are integrated, prepared and presented to the doctors participating in the tumor board.
• Use Case Cardiology: Patients with heart failure will be enabled to link their own health-related data (such as physical activity data) with their patient record to document the further recovery process beyond their inpatient stay. Thus, an information system will be established, which provides physicians with objective measures and enables targeted recommendations.
• Use Case Infection Control: This use case aims for the early detection and prevention of infection clusters of various pathogens (e.g., MRSA) by analyzing combined patient movement (admission, transfer, and discharge) and microbiology data within the hospital.

Even the research profits by the cross-institutional exchange of medical data, because it can be helpful for the treatment of a new patient to have information about similar cases. Furthermore, it is possible to get an empirically sound number of cases for rare diseases and new insights about these diseases.

Publications of the Data Integration Center

Peer-reviewed publications

• Wulff A, Haarbrandt B, Marschollek M. Clinical Knowledge Governance Framework for Nationwide Data Infrastructure Projects. Stud Health Technol Inform. 2018;248:196-203. Pubmed-ID: 29726437
• Haarbrandt B, Schreiweis B, Rey S et al. HiGHmed - An Open Platform Approach to Enhance Care and Research across Institutional Boundaries. Methods Inf Med. 2018;57 (S 01) e66-e81. Pubmed-ID: 30016813
• Wulff A, Haarbrandt B, Tute E, Marschollek M, Beerbaum P, Jack T. An interoperable clinical decision-support system for early detection of SIRS in pediatric intensive care using openEHR. Artif Intell Med. 2018;89:10-23. Pubmed-ID: 29753616
• Tute E, Wulff A, Marschollek M, Gietzelt M. Clinical Information Model Based Data Quality Checks: Theory and Example. Stud Health Technol Inform. 2019;258:80-85. Pubmed-ID: 30942719
• Wulff A, Sommer KK, Ballout S, HiGHmed Consortium, Haarbrandt B, Gietzelt M. A Report on Archetype Modelling in a Nationwide Data Infrastructure Project. Stud Health Technol Inform. 2019;258:146-150. Pubmed-ID: 30942733
• Fiebeck J, Gietzelt M, Ballout S, et al. Implementing LOINC: Current Status and Ongoing Work at the Hannover Medical School. Stud Health Technol Inform. 2019;258:247-248. Pubmed-ID: 30942760

Professional talks

• Haarbrandt B. 2nd Arctic Conference on openEHR, January 18, 2018, Tromsø, Norway.
• Gietzelt M. [The project HiGHmed - Overview and intermediate result.] MHH WG Data Science, April 20, 2018, Hannover, Germany.
• Wulff A. Clinical Knowledge Governance Framework for Nationwide Data Infrastructure Projects. eHealth 2018 Wien, May 08, 2018, Vienna, Austria.
• Haarbrandt B. HiGHmed - An open platform approach to enable data sharing. 2nd HiGHmed Symposium - openEHR: Open Data Platforms in Medical Informatics, June 18, 2018, Heidelberg, Germany
• Marco-Ruiz L. The LHS-Toolbox: Secondary Use of Primary Care Data in Norway. 2nd HiGHmed Symposium - openEHR: Open Data Platforms in Medical Informatics, June 18, 2018, Heidelberg, Germany
• Haarbrandt B. Open Platform Architectures: A Prerequisite to Enable Efficient Reuse of EHR data. GMDS (JGEHRS), September 03, 2018, Osnabrück, Germany.
• Marschollek M. Keeping Infections in Check: HiGHmed's Contribution to a Nationwide Infection Control. GMDS, September 04, 2018, Osnabrück, Germany.
• Haarbrandt B. HiGHmed - An Open Platform Approach to Enhance Care and Research Across Institutional Boundaries. Oslo åpen plattform-dag, September 13, 2018, Oslo, Norway.
• Gietzelt M. HiGHmed IT-Solution Smart Infection Control System (SmICS). MeDIC-Kickoff, October 12, 2018, Berlin, Germany.
• Ballout S. openEHR - the "Open Platform" Revolution. SWAT4HCLS Conference, December 04, 2018, Antwerp, Belgium.
• Ballout S. Healthcare Interoperability Panel Discussion. SWAT4HCLS Conference, December 05, 2018, Antwerp, Belgium.
• Baier C, Wulff A. [HiGHmed - Medical informatics for infection control.] Infection Control Symposium: Technologies - Trends - Regulations, December 05, 2018, Hannover, Germany.
• Gietzelt M. [HiGHmed - Data integration in medicine.] eHealth.Niedersachsen Conference, January 16, 2019, Hannover, Germany.
• Gerbel S, Fiebeck J, Strauch N. [Role models and female pionieers in informatics.] MHH AG Data Science, March 08, 2019, Hannover, Germany.
• Haarbrandt B. An Open Platform Approach to Enhance Care and Research Across Institutional Boundaries. Health Interoperability Symposium, March 14, 2019, Cardiff, Wales, UK.
• Fiebeck J. Implementing LOINC:Current Status and Ongoing Work at the Hannover Medical School. EFMI STC 2019, April 08, 2019, Hannover, Germany.
• Tute E. Clinical Information Model Based Data Quality Checks:Theory and Example. EFMI STC 2019, April 08, 2019, Hannover, Germany.
• Wulff A. A Report on Archetype Modelling in a Nationwide Data Infrastructure Project. EFMI STC 2019, April 09, 2019, Hannover, Germany.
• Haarbrandt B. [Results of the consortia of the Medical Informatice Inititative: HiGHmed - Experiences from the MeDIC of Hannover Medical School.] DMEA, April 09, 2019, Berlin, Germany.
• Wulff A. HiGHmed: Medical informatics for optimized infection control. Petersburger Dialog: Antimicrobial Resistance, May 17, 2019, Hannover, Germany.

Public events and talks

• Strauch N. [Medical informatic initiative HiGHmed - a new chance for women?]. MHH WG Equal Opportunities, May 31, 2018, Hannover, Germany.
• Gietzelt M. [HiGHmed - Data integration in medicine.] 12min.Med Life Science Talks & Networking #6, November 15, 2018, Hannover, Germany.
• Gietzelt M, Haarbrandt B, Marschollek M, Tute E, Wulff A. [HiGHmed - Research and Care: Data integration in medicine.] 2. Lower Saxony Digital Health Summit, November 28, 2018, Hannover, Germany.
• Haarbrandt B. [openEHR in the clinical environment.] Dialogue on Hospital-IT and Medical Technology, January 09, 2019, Duisburg, Germany.
• Behrends M, Hoffmann I. [The project HiGHmed: The benefits for teaching.] MHH Tag der Lehre, March 21, 2019, Hannover, Germany.
• Ballout S, Rehberg A. [The role of the data stewards in HiGHmed.] Colloquium at the Hochschule Hannover - University of Applied Sciences and Arts, May 14, 2019, Hannover , Germany.
• Marschollek M. [The digital patient - What's that supposed to mean?] Patient University, May 28, 2019, Hannover, Germany.
• Gietzelt M. [HiGHmed - Research and care: Data integration in medicine.] Patient University, May 28, 2019, Hannover, Germany.

Videos

• Haarbrandt B. [English] HiGHmed - An Open Platform Approach to Enhance Care and Research Across Institutional Boundaries. Oslo åpen plattform-dag, September 13, 2018, Oslo, Norwegen.
• Bavendiek U, Marschollek M. [German] [Best-Practice in Lower Saxony.] 2. Lower Saxony Digital Health Summit, November 28, 2018, Hannover, Germany.