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~+Steve Harris, [[http://www.cancergrid.org|CancerGrid]] talk - 10 March 2006+~

At the moment research done via paper mostly.  Protocol and data capture forms etc.

= Aims =
  Open standards for breast cancer clinical trials

  Enhanced data discovery

  Routine meta-analysis

  Data ingegration
  
= Methods =
  Harmonised vocabularies

  Different data stores
    Need semantics of measurements recorded somewhere

= Benefits =
  Tamoxifen (drug given to prevent breast cancer recurrence)

  Herceptin

  VIOXX
  
  Mostly down to intelligent interpretation of trial results
  
  That's what "meta-analysis" means - computers helping with that process.
    Always done in the past.  Done on paper.  Laborious.
    
  Want to embed software in people's work (even if that means plug-ins for MS Word etc.etc.

  Open standards, open source, free at point of use
  
= Networks =
  Virtual collaboration support, video conferencing, identity management

  Integration, security, workflow, access

  Need to delegate - boss delegating the typing in of notes to other clinician etc.

  Identity/roles etc. an issue so that access to data is affected.
  
  Methods
    Clinical trials portal

    Message level security
    

= Things that others could reuse =
  Personal video conferencing (not access grid!)

  ontologies and standards inside user tools

  XML databases with full MDG

  Web services that talk to both Java and .Net
  
  
= Why did they drop personal access grid? =
    Too hard for clinicians

    Have been using something called Polycom PVX
      Standards based H.323

    More deployable than personal AccessGrid

    Software about £90 (return ticket to London!?!)
  
= Protocol designer =
  Click a button in MS Word that builds an XML description of the trial.

= eXist =
  Free open source XML database stack
    Schema binding etc. etc.

  Almost there in terms of XML database being able to draw clear UML diagrams
  
= Gaps =
  Distributed integrated security (Shibboleth?)

  Semantic web - topic maps/RDF/OWL  (OWL ontology too new, unfinished)
  

= Cancergrid in context (its place in e-Health at Oxford) =
  CGs push for open documented standards in the NHS  (e.g. how do they measure blood pressure and record it)

  Push to think about ''data'' rather than 'systems'
    Really, the only thing that matters is "data".  The system can be built around it.  Can have multiple systems.
      e.g. we've been measuring blood pressure for decades (hundreds?) of years, but our understanding of what it means has changed hugely.
  
  Trying to push idea of semantic grid
    On the desktops

    In default working environment

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