Medical Informatics Initiative launches transsectoral network

Berlin, 09/12/2021. As part of the Medical Informatics Initiative (MII), the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) is funding six new collaborative projects, known as “Digital Hubs: Advances in Research and Health Care”. Their objective is to improve the availability of data and collaboration between different areas of health care – from inpatient care, to outpatient treatment, to rehabilitation and aftercare. Using these hubs will allow the MII to integrate outpatient sector data in the future. On this date, hub representatives attended the MII national steering committee for the first time to discuss the coordinated development of the initiative.

Logo Digitale FortschrittsHubs Gesundheit

The MII research data infrastructure is based on the data integration centres of the university hospitals. The MII has established a federated and decentralised IT infrastructure at 29 university hospitals across the country. In the data integration centres, research and care data from the university hospitals is cross-linked and made available to medical researchers in accordance with data protection regulations. The MII's digital solutions currently used by university hospitals are now being extended to incorporate other medical practitioners. In future, for example, the hubs will link the data integration centres with regional practices and outpatient care partners, such as hospitals, doctors' surgeries, ambulance services and nursing and rehabilitation facilities. Research institutions and health insurance companies are also members of the hubs.

“Linking the Medical Informatics Initiative with partners from the outpatient and regional sectors is an important step in making health data from different sources available for medical research in compliance with legal data protection requirements”, says Sebastian C. Semler, head of the MII Coordination Office. "Our goal is to use this database to improve our analysis and understanding of case histories”.

Using data from the entire chain of medical care to improve therapies

The hubs have a wide range of uses from cancer treatment to the care of people with cardiovascular diseases, follow-up care after intensive medical treatment and pandemic management.

“Physicians must be able to assess the overall course of an individual disease from every point in the healthcare system to make optimum and personalised therapy decisions”, says Prof. Dagmar Krefting, University Medical Centre Göttingen.

She coordinates one of the innovation hubs. Their objective is to improve communication between ambulances and clinics by employing digital solutions, using the example of emergency stroke care. Relevant patient data, such as acute symptoms, blood pressure and information on the severity of the stroke, must be transferred more efficiently from the ambulance to the hospital. Software systems will also use artificial intelligence methods to show the rescue team the nearest and best-equipped clinic and assist doctors in making treatment decisions.

More information:

Digital ProgessHubs Health (MII website)

Press contact:

Sophie Haderer, Tel.: +49 30 − 22 00 24 732, E-Mail: presse@tmf-ev.de

Background:

The aim of the Medical Informatics Initiative (MII) is to improve research opportunities and patient care through innovative IT solutions. These should enable the exchange and use of data from patient care, clinical and biomedical research across the boundaries of institutions and locations. The Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) is funding the MII with around 180 million euros until 2022.

In the four consortia DIFUTURE, HiGHmed, MIRACUM and SMITH, all university medicine institutions in Germany at over 30 locations are working together with research institutions, companies, health insurance companies and patient representatives to develop the general conditions so that findings from research can reach patients directly. Data protection and data security are top priorities.

A coordination office operated by TMF - Technology, Methods and Infrastructure for Networked Medical Research with the German Association of Medical Faculties (MFT) and the German Association of Academic Medical Centers (VUD) in Berlin is responsible for the national coordination of the MII.

As of this year, the BMBF is funding the "Digital Hubs: Advances in Research and Health Care” with a total of 50 million euros until 2025.