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Editor’s Note Moving From Big Data to Vital Insights
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Big Data promises to transform the rapidly expanding collection of health data we see today into smart, relevant, and actionable knowledge to deliver personalized health. Yet, traditional methods of clinical research cannot handle the volume, variability, velocity, and veracity of data that is currently being generated. Successful, real-world examples of this Big Data in health, therefore, are rare, and important problems remain unsolved. Not surprisingly, some now question if the ultimate impact of Big Data in medicine will be largely incremental rather than transformational. This is a story that needs to be changed, and we at Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes believe that our journal can be a positive vehicle for this process. In this issue, readers will find a series of articles that tackle Big Data in health. Some of these use novel data sources and analytic tools to provide valuable insights into aspects of old problems like hospital performance or readmission and emerging problems like the value of teamwork in healthcare. Others present new work in more effective ways by examining how we can best evaluate machine learning and the value of data mining for complex associations like drug–drug interactions. All of these articles help us to take a step toward the promise of Big Data. Of course, to ensure that we are not getting too carried away by its promises, we have also published a series of Cardiovascular Perspectives by leading experts. These perspectives highlight both upcoming challenges and opportunities with Big Data, including the challenge of training a new generation of health services and outcomes researchers proficient in their methods. These articles are a reminder that the road will be hard. Finally, Dr Montori offers a contribution based on his keynote address at the first Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute Annual Meeting (PCORI) held in Washington, DC, in 2015. The goal, as he reminds us, is to ultimately solve problems that advance the health of individuals and populations—a vision that will require Big Science more than Big Data. The inspiration behind this forward-thinking issue on Big Data has been Drs Harlan Krumholz and Sharon-Lise Normand, the Editor and Statistical Editor of Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes over the last 8 years. I want to thank them for taking us in this exciting direction. The new Editorial Board views manuscripts such as the work sampled here as a key area of interest for us. To this end, we are planning an updated statistical primer series led by Dr Armando TeixeiraPinto, our incoming Statistical Editor, which will cover a range of new topics, including machine learning and data visualization. I hope you enjoy this issue and encourage you to start with Dr Krumholz’s Editor’s Perspective on the opportunities and challenges of Big Data. Brahmajee K. Nallamothu, MD, MPH
Editor Elect Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes
The opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those of the American Heart Association. From the VA Health Services Research and Development Center for Clinical Management Research, VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System, MI; Michigan Center for Health Analytics and Medical Prediction (M-CHAMP), Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor. Correspondence to University of Michigan Cardiovascular Center, CVC Cardiovascular Medicine–SPC 5869, 1500 E. Medical Center Dr, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109. E-mail
[email protected] (Circ Cardiovasc Qual Outcomes. 2016;9:00. DOI: 10.1161/CIRCOUTCOMES.116.003375.) © 2016 American Heart Association, Inc. Circ Cardiovasc Qual Outcomes is available at http://circoutcomes.ahajournals.org
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DOI: 10.1161/CIRCOUTCOMES.116.003375
Moving From Big Data to Vital Insights Brahmajee K. Nallamothu
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Circ Cardiovasc Qual Outcomes. published online November 8, 2016; Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes is published by the American Heart Association, 7272 Greenville Avenue, Dallas, TX 75231 Copyright © 2016 American Heart Association, Inc. All rights reserved. Print ISSN: 1941-7705. Online ISSN: 1941-7713
The online version of this article, along with updated information and services, is located on the World Wide Web at: http://circoutcomes.ahajournals.org/content/early/2016/11/08/CIRCOUTCOMES.116.003375.citation
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