The researchers of the company Trium Analysis Online, who are involved in the Sylvia Lawry Centre for Multiple Sclerosis Research, developed interactive OLAP-tools, which meet very well the high requirements of medical research. OLAP means Online Analytical Processing. These sophisticated analysis services, which had been tailored for medical research, could now prove themselves successfully in practice.
In fact, the company Trium Analysis Online developed them for two working groups of the Sylvia Lawry Centre, but in principle they can be of great use for all people interested in medical research.
Among other things, the software gives users the opportunity to simultaneously exchange experience, data and results in real time via internet, for example during a conference call.
The nine members of the MRI working group of the Sylvia Lawry Centre, who come from seven different countries, exchange for example their research results by means of OLAP in regular conference calls since August 2002. This top-class program is user-friendly, easy to deal with and guarantees the highest security standards with respect to confidentiality. By means of the software, the MRI working group consisting of neurologists, mathematicians and statisticians can graphically present their research results, which are relevant for all participants, in a very fast and comprehensible way. Furthermore, this innovation in information technology is able to process data, which was newly entered into the net during the ongoing conference, in a second's time. The clinical trials working group of the Sylvia Lawry Centre uses OLAP in the same way. Researchers of different study fields are so offered a common platform which is comprehensible and visible for all.
Video conferences and conference calls already facilitated the communication between interlocutors from all over the world and saved a lot of travel expenses and time, but with OLAP medical research can even be optimised. Up to now, it was impossible for researchers on different locations to simultaneously have a clear guide through their results in the net, which can even be updated immediately.
The team of the Sylvia Lawry Centre already benefits from the OLAP technology of Trium because it considerably accelerates the working process. At the research centre the biggest MS database worldwide is being formed at the moment: it includes datasets from 9000 patients and about 35 000 patient years. It is a challenge to structure and evaluate this data pool, which the team has easily managed so far. With the help of the newly developed software the doors are now open for the progress of explosive medical research projects.
The Sylvia Lawry Centre of Multiple Sclerosis Research (SLCMSR), founded in 2001 under the management of Prof. Dr. Albrecht Neiß due to an initiative of the Multiple Sclerosis International Federation (MSIF), has set itself the goal to accelerate the development of drugs in the future and to make them more cost-effective. To achieve this goal, there are already data of more than 9000 patients with nearly 35 000 patient years available and all big pharmaceutical industries and also a huge part of the most important academic research groups have contributed with their trial data to this data pool. At present the biggest MS database of the world is arising at the SLCMSR.
Source: Sylvia Lawry Centre for Multiple Sclerosis Research (SLCMSR) 10/23/02
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