07 Sep ‘Record’ gains in bringing research closer to the patient

Experts discuss solving the EHR-compatibility puzzle in point-of-care trials

By Christine Bahls, Applied Clinical Trials

At the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, researchers are laying the groundwork for future massive genotype-based studies. Within three to six years, the database is expected to hold the sequenced DNA samples of one million people—all patients of the Mount Sinai Hospital System.

In Oregon and California, researchers wanted to see if people who were overdue for a colon cancer screening test would take one if they were mailed a FIT test. It took one year to identify 41,193 people in 26 federally qualified health clinics.

And in the Northwell Health System, researchers culled their electronic health record (EHR) system for patients with specific COVID-19 symptoms to help them determine whether the use of famotidine would shorten the number of days a COVID patient contended with symptoms. They found 55 fitting the bill within six weeks.

At the University of California, San Francisco, and across the country at Temple University Hospital, oncologist researcher Laura Esserman, MD, MBA, and pulmonologist Gerard Criner, MD, respectively, have been using their EHR systems for years to run pragmatic trials and to find eligible clinical trial patients in their respective clinics. Once found, the medical teams embed the trial into patient care. Read more …