International Electronic Health Record-Derived COVID-19 Clinical Course Profiles: The 4CE Consortium

Abstract

We leveraged the largely untapped resource of electronic health record data to address critical clinical and epidemiological questions about Coronavirus Disease 2019 . To do this, we formed an international consortium (4CE) of 96 hospitals across 5 countries (www.covidclinical.net). Contributors utilized the Informatics for Integrating Biology and the Bedside (i2b2) or Observational Medical Outcomes Partnership (OMOP) platforms to map to a common data model. The group focused on comorbidities and temporal changes in key laboratory test values. Harmonized data were analyzed locally and converted to a shared aggregate form for rapid analysis and visualization of regional differences and global commonalities. Data covered 27,584 COVID-19 cases with 187,802 laboratory tests. Case counts and laboratory trajectories were concordant with existing literature. Laboratory tests at the time of diagnosis showed hospital-level differences equivalent to country-level variation across the consortium partners. Despite the limitations of decentralized data generation, we established a framework to capture the trajectory of COVID-19 disease in patients and their response to interventions.

Deep phenotyping of 34,128 adult patients hospitalised with COVID-19 in an international network study

“…This project has received support from the European Health Data and Evidence Network Edward Burn 1,2,51 , Seng Chan You 3,51 , Anthony G. Sena 4,5 , Kristin Kostka 6 , Hamed Abedtash 7 , Maria Tereza F. Abrahão 8 , Amanda Alberga 9 , Heba Alghoul 10 , Osaid Alser 11 , Thamir M. Alshammari 12 , Maria Aragon 1 , Carlos Areia 13 , Juan M. Banda 14 , Jaehyeong Cho 3 , Aedin C. Culhane 15 , Alexander Davydov 16,17 , Frank J. DeFalco 4 , Talita Duarte-Salles 1 , Scott DuVall 18,19 , Thomas Falconer 20 , Sergio Fernandez-Bertolin 1 , Weihua Gao 21 , Asieh Golozar 22,23 , Jill Hardin 4 , George Hripcsak 20,24 , Vojtech Huser 25 , Hokyun Jeon 26 , Yonghua Jing 21 , Chi Young Jung 27 , Benjamin Skov Kaas-Hansen 28,29 , Denys Kaduk 16,30 , Seamus Kent 31 , Yeesuk Kim 32 , Spyros Kolovos 33 , Jennifer C. E. Lane 33 , Hyejin Lee 34 , Kristine E. Lynch 18,19…”

Ideas for how informaticians can get involved with COVID-19 research

“…Fortunately, there are several efforts to establish data-sharing consortia that provide an opportunity for informaticians to assist with analyses. For example, the Consortium for Clinical Characterization of COVID-19 by EHR, or 4 CE (https://covidclinical.net/), has released summary-level COVID-19 data from several countries including France, Germany, Italy, Singapore, and the United States along with a preprint of the initial analyses [16].…”

SARS-COV-2 associated acute pancreatitis: Cause, consequence or epiphenomenon?

“…Not only is there the possibility of over-reporting SARS-CoV-2 associated AP, there could also be under-reporting. The recently formed Consortium for Clinical Characterisation of COVID-19 comprising 96 hospitals across five countries has generated a database of anonymised electronic health records from 21,324 patients [6]. Of the 34 patients with a diagnosis of AP, 24 did not have a stated cause.…”