Is this the golden age for open patient level oncology data?

Over the last few years there has been a growth in databases that house individual patient data from clinical trials in Oncology.  In this blog post we will take a look at two of these databases, ProjectDataSphere and ClinicalStudyDataRequest, and discuss our own experiences of using them for research.

ProjectDataSphere houses the control arms of many phase III clinical trials. It has been used to run prediction competitions which we have discussed in a previous blog-post, see here. Gaining access to this database is rather straightforward.  A user simply fills in a form and within 24-48 hours access is granted. You can then download the data sets together with a data dictionary to help you decipher the variable codes and start your research project.  This all sounds too easy, so what’s the catch?

The main issue is being able to understand the coding of the variables, once you’ve deciphered what they mean it’s pretty straightforward to begin a project.  It does help if you have had experience working with such data-sets before. An example of a project that can be conducted with such data can be found here. In brief, the paper explores both a biased and un-biased correlation of tumour growth rate to survival, a topic we have blogged about before, see here.

If you want to access all arms of a clinical trial then ClinicalStudyDataRequest is for you. This is a very large database that spans many disease areas. However access to the data is not as straightforward as ProjectDataSphere.  A user must submit an analysis plan stating the research objectives, methods, relevant data-sets etc. Once the plan has been approved, which can take between 1-2 months from our experience, access is granted to the data-sets.  This access though is far more restrictive than ProjectDataSphere.  The user connects to a server where the data is stored and has to perform all analysis using the software provided, which is R with a limited number of libraries. Furthermore there is a time-restriction on how long you can have access to the data.  Therefore it really is a good idea to have every aspect of your analysis planned and ensure you have the time to complete it.

An example of a project we have undertaken using this database can be found here. In brief the paper describes how a model of tumour growth can be used to analyse the decay and growth rates of tumours under the action of three drugs that have a similar mechanism of action. A blog-post discussing the motivation behind the tumour growth model can be found here.

There are of course many databases other than the two discussed here with an oncology focus, e.g. SEER, TCGA, YODA etc. The growth in such databases clearly suggests that this may well be the golden age for patient level oncology data. Hopefully this growth in open data will also lead to a growth in knowledge.