A team from the Universitat Politècnica de València (UPV), belonging to the ITACA-SABIEN group, has taught throughout last week an international course on Big Data in Health organised by the European regional office of the World Health Organisation (WHO).
The course, held in Valencia, was attended by around thirty experts from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Georgia, working on research/knowledge integration and policy development on Big Data in the field of health.
The WHO regional officer for the European region continues its collaboration with the UPV for the second year for this course due to its knowledge and proven experience in Big Data and Health after the implementation and application of these tools in the Valencian health environment, thanks to work developed by the ITACA-SABIEN group of the UPV.
The concept of Big Data is already more than a trend. Moreover, in the healthcare field, the growth in the volume of health-related data generated has been a constant over the last 30 years, with the widespread adoption in healthcare institutions of electronic health data, digital imaging, clinical prescription, patient management, patient monitoring, clinical decision support systems, laboratory information systems and a long list of specialised systems.
“This amount of data generated daily offers a great opportunity for the sector, incorporating Big Data functions as a key element to optimise healthcare systems and reduce inequalities,” explains Vicente Traver, director of the SABIEN group at the ITACA Institute of the Politècnica de València.
Spring School of the WHO regional office for the European region
The course “Impact Training on Big Data in Health Systems” is part of the implementation of the regional digital health action plan for the European region for the period 2023-2030, promoted by the Regional Office for Europe of the World Health Organization, through its Health Policies and Systems Division (HPS).
Throughout the week, different lectures, exercises, visits and group work have taken place, and all attendees have also developed a roadmap to successfully deploy a Big Data for Health use case in their respective national health systems.
“In this way, the course has provided ideas and solutions to improve national health information systems that are directly applicable to the country situations of each participant. We have offered them the keys to boost Big Data, from defining their implementation strategy and ensuring investment to, for example, taking advantage of the enormous potential of Artificial Intelligence in this field,” concludes Antonio Martínez, senior researcher and co-director of the course.
Source: UPV’s Communication Area