This project will develop a coordinated nationally accessible real time data repository and advanced machine learning analytics platform, that supports clinician decisions, diagnosis, triage of critically ill patients, and trials of new therapeutics. Development of an imaging database and inclusion of lung CT imaging data and training program for radiologists and clinicians will increase the diagnosis and rapid clinical triage of at-risk patients.
Importantly this project will provide significant progress towards development of adaptive clinical trials systems in Australia that allow significantly faster and less expensive trials for new drug candidates developed by our research and biopharmaceutical sector.
Lead Investigators: Tom Snelling, University of Sydney, Stuart Grieve, University of Sydney
Collaborators: Matthew Bellgard, Queensland University of Technology
Key Organisations: Telethon Kids, WA, Monash University, Queensland University of Technology, Digital Health CRC, NSW Health and Queensland Health. Partner organisations: – LungScreen Australia, I-MED Radiology, ANZSTR, Epworth Healthcare, RPA Radiology.
Objectives
Develop a COVID-19 clinical data analytic platform (CDAP)
- Secure a nationally consistent repository of clinical, laboratory and imaging data for COVID-19 patients that is accessible by authorised users;
- Support real-time analytics of the clinical data to inform best-evidence patient care;
- Support the implementation of adaptive clinical trials aimed at improving detection, treatment and prevention of COVID-19;
- Enable long-term (including patient-reported) longitudinal follow up of individuals with COVID-19.
The C19 iBank project will support and facilitate large scale imaging research on COVID-19 data in order to develop and distribute:
- New diagnostic and prognostic imaging tools that support better clinical decisions;
- Educational tools for health professionals to improve reporting and standardization of COVID-19 imaging cases;
- Accurate scoring of data for clinical trials to improve the power of clinical trials to prevent severe disease, enable pooling of imaging data.
Research Plan
CDAP We will adapt an existing, open source, modular, web-based, data capture and repository solution to rapidly build and deploy the COVID-19 CDAP to systematically capture diagnostic, treatment and outcome data on people diagnosed in community and/or presenting to hospitals with proven or suspected COVID-19. This repository will link diagnostic laboratory, and clinical data (including data from C19 iBank) and incorporate data from the other projects in this program, platform clinical trials (e.g. ASCOT, a treatment trial in seriously ill hospitalised patients). The decision-support tool will be informed by a model that will be constantly updated as data accumulate through the pandemic.
C19 iBank iCoreLab at The University of Sydney have created a secure, scalable imaging data collection system that permits anonymous storage of patient data but retains capability to perform linkage when appropriate governance and ethics exists. Originally designed for brain and cardiovascular research, this platform has adapted and accelerated to form a COVID-19 specific imaging bank – “C19 iBank”. The Snow Foundation contribution will fund the initial phase of the project. This involves the design and configuration of the DataBank, creation of a network of sites to contribute data, distribution of reporting templates and creation of reporting templates that make annotation of data more efficient. The C19 iBank has a highly scalable structure and will collect data across as many sites Nationally and internationally as possible. We are in discussion with numerous sites and have started to process Italian data.