In 2019, HUS prepared for the adoption of the Apotti patient information system across the board. Apotti incorporated functions for receiving and processing biobank consent.
The Helsinki Biobank also adopted the new HUSLAB information systems My+ and My+ Patologia.
At the beginning of 2019, we improved information management in our sample delivery process in order to be able to distribute single DNA samples to several research projects and to facilitate simultaneous sample deliveries to research projects covering hundreds or thousands of samples.
The first batch of genotype data from the FinnGen project was received by the biobank. We were able to proceed with developing the capability required for processing and interpreting genotype data.
We revised the Helsinki Biobank sample donor e-service and began development of a service portal for donors. Our work prepares the way for a national participation portal where all biobanks can provide consistent responses to donor’s registry data queries.
We participated in the further development of the Fingenious biobank service, leading to the introduction of an expanded Fingenious portal by the Finnish biobank network. Through this new service, researcher clients can themselves search for the availability of Finnish biobank samples by sample type and by disorder group before performing a more detailed availability search and submitting a sample application.
The HUS Data Pool was established as a permanent feature in our biobank operations and already allows sample and information deliveries for research projects on a larger scale than before. Within HUS, we enhanced our collaboration with analytics and AI development services at HUS Information Management to progress towards shared practices and analytical environments.
We participated in projects on the further IT processing of patient registry data and in various projects to improve various data availability services and to introduce them for testing. We began modelling the treatment paths for four common types of cancer, which in the future may facilitate deriving information on the patient’s treatment path and response to treatment automatically from the raw data in patient registries.