How Big Data Can Help You & the Lung Cancer Community

Before they became successful, companies that deliver lifechanging services we now take for granted -- like Uber and Waze -- were simply an idea. Success only came as a result of community engagement.

The lung cancer community now has an opportunity to contribute to a robust database of medical records that will be available free of charge to every lung cancer patient who contributes their records.

Power to the patient

“Our motto is ‘Power to the Patient,’” says Ed Spiegel of Peer Medical. “We are democratizing medical information with a database powered by patients for patients.”

Working with patients on a secure platform, Peer Medical is crowdsourcing the collective knowledge of the cancer community, Spiegel says. Unlike other medical record repositories where users only get aggregate results, the Peer Medical platform facilitates peer-to-peer information sharing. Peer-to-peer information sharing means that the patients who contribute their medical data will have full access to the database with their medical data and that of other lung cancer patients.

Incentivizing sharing

“Our initial focus is completely on lung,” says Spiegel. Peer Medical is accepting any and all types of lung cancer patients or survivors.

Still, in early development phase, Peer Medical currently is focused on recruitment and populating its lung cancer database. During its initial recruitment phase, Peer Medical will donate $100 to a lung cancer advocacy group for each patient who contributes records. At LiveLung’s request, Peer Medical will share the financial rewards with patients. Everyone who donates their medical records using the link below will receive a $50 Visa gift card for their personal use. In addition, LiveLung will receive a $50 donation from Peer Medical for each completed donation.

Not only does the patient receive a financial incentive for donating their own medical records, but they could also receive rewards for referring other lung cancer patients to the program.

The case for big data

“In healthcare,” says Spiegel, “big data is very important. It helps people make better decisions. Seeing what hundreds, thousands or hundreds of thousands of others going through a similar experience and understanding their results is invaluable to making better decisions. This knowledge is power. We’ve already seen this in several different industries.”

For example, the navigational app Waze is a product of shared data. Through a community of more than 115 million users, Waze keeps drivers informed in real-time about traffic patterns, accidents, roadkill and the presence of police. Other apps will help navigate you from point A to point B but not with the helpful information provided through other drivers on a similar journey.

What is crowdsourcing?

“Waze is a perfect example of crowdsourcing and people reporting their outcomes of driving,” says Spiegel. “They report, there’s an accident here, there’s a policeman here, there’s a pothole there.”

Crowdsourcing is described as “a sourcing model in which individuals or organizations obtain goods and services, including ideas and finances, from a large, relatively open and often rapidly-evolving group of internet users.” Waze professes to “empower people to make better choices” and help drivers reach their destination “faster, smoother, safer, and happier.”

Peer Medical can change lung cancer research

Everyone in the lung cancer community would like these benefits applied to our lung cancer journey. When lung cancer patients share their medical data, on a personal level, the patient potentially reaps the benefits of having a smoother journey during their treatment or recovering process. On a larger scale, big data has the potential to significantly advance lung cancer research, ultimately benefiting all lung cancer patients.

Read more about Peer Medical in How Big Data Can Help You & the Lung Cancer Community: Part 2.