The aim of IMI’s EHDEN project is to make the large-scale analysis of health data in Europe a reality. It is doing this by building a federated data network allowing access to the data of greater than 100 million EU citizens standardised to a common data model. At the heart of the project is a growing group of trained, certified small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) responsible for transforming the data owned by hospitals, and others, to this common data model.
The training materials designed for these SMEs formed the basis of the EHDEN Academy, expanding to methods, skills and tools for working with real world data to generate real world evidence. The Academy was launched in April 2020 and has now attracted over 1 000 enrollees from 46 countries worldwide.
Today, the academy features 9 courses and a faculty of 10 expert instructors. The courses are freely available on demand and represent an important source of training for anyone who generates and uses data, works with it, or is involved in the development and use of analytical tools.
Looking to the future, EHDEN plans to generate more educational content for its academy, including on the technical aspects of working with real-world data, and the tools, methods and skills to generate real-world evidence. Meanwhile, content from within EHDEN itself, on the technology architecture and methods being created in the project, are also slated for development. One course on these topics is being designed specifically for citizens and patient organisations.
‘Whilst 1 000 enrollees in its first year is indeed a significant achievement, moreover, it underscores the demand for high quality and free training on how to use the latest tools and tackle the complexities of observational research,’ said Nigel Hughes, EHDEN Project Lead. ‘It’s also a great example of the collaborative spirit that is at the heart of the Academy’s mission to provide quality education for the open science community at scale. We look forward to the continued evolution of the Academy’s curriculum, number of instructors and enrollees, and its contribution to expanding the knowledge of those working with real-world data.’