SPHN Advances Precision Health: Standardizing Data for Breakthroughs in Swiss Healthcare
Revolutionizing Swiss healthcare, SPHN standardizes diverse university hospital data for precision medicine. National Data Streams propel innovations in infection detection, oncology, and pediatrics. Collaborative efforts redefine personalized health research, enabling groundbreaking advancements for patient care and outcomes.
In her recently published article in the SAEZ, Ines Böhm highlights the close cooperation between SPHN, PHRT and NDS. In doing so, she offers good insights into the joint perspectives for Swiss citizens:
The Swiss Personalized Health Network (SPHN) has successfully standardized health data from Swiss university hospitals, overcoming challenges in data heterogeneity and fostering collaboration among healthcare institutions. The initiative focuses on personalized medicine, utilizing large datasets encompassing clinical, genomic, transcriptomic, proteomic, and metabolomic data, as well as information from registers, studies, and cohorts. By storing, linking, and analyzing these diverse datasets, SPHN aims to enable more precise diagnoses, individualized therapies, risk identification, and early prevention.
SPHN, launched by the Swiss government in 2016, comprises university hospitals, universities, and technical institutions. Initially facing heterogeneous data landscapes and cultural challenges, the initiative has developed mutual understanding and visions for data exchange. Data standards and services, including secure data pipelines through BioMedIT, have been established, ensuring data integrity and building trust among participating hospitals and patients.
The initiative has facilitated the creation of National Data Streams (NDS) platforms, supporting research in intensive care, oncology, pediatrics, and healthcare. Notable projects include the analysis of complex data from intensive care patients with severe infections and the advancement of precision oncology. The SwissPedHealth-NDS focuses on pediatric personalized medicine, emphasizing early detection of rare diseases. Additionally, the LUCID project monitors medical processes, aiming to reveal over-treatment trends and improve care quality. Through these endeavors, SPHN is at the forefront of advancing personalized healthcare in Switzerland.
The complete article is available in external page german and external page french.
Through its close links with the external page committees of the "Strategic Focus Area Personalized Health and Related Technologies" (PHRT), the Institute for Translational Sciences plays a key role in bridging the gap between basic research and clinical application in the field of personalized health solutions.