ROCKVILLE, MD — The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has awarded an Abt Associates-led team a contract to prepare for the next public health emergency. Abt and its partner, HealthVerity, will provide data that federal, state, territory, and local governments and other organizations can use to target interventions and countermeasures in the event of a public health emergency.

The COVID-19 pandemic made it abundantly clear that the nation’s ability to identify and respond to outbreaks fundamentally relies on access to high-quality and timely data for disease surveillance—especially data about vulnerable populations and response capacity. This five-year, $9.2 million contract will help the nation prepare for an effective response.

Abt and HealthVerity will create and disseminate user-friendly data products that will capture key socio-demographic and health information by sourcing, integrating, analyzing, and packaging disparate datasets. The team of data scientists and epidemiologists will combine large data sets from a variety of industry and government sources with massive computing power, automation, analytics, and artificial intelligence. This approach will provide data to inform plans and responses to public health emergencies in an equitable manner that is focused on local communities. Abt brings over two decades of CDC program expertise to the project, which aims to provide practical insights and recommendations to all Americans.

The data that the team will integrate include medical claims data, social media data, data from service providers (healthcare providers, schools, universities, nursing homes, and correctional facilities), market research, and data from the U.S. Census Bureau, the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, and other publicly available sources.

“We can’t afford to be unprepared for the next outbreak,” says Gabriella Newes-Adeyi, senior client account lead and advisor to the project. “The work we will do for CDC will give governments at all levels the information they need to safeguard the nation’s health, in particular the health of those most in need.”

About Abt Associates

Abt Associates is a global consulting and research firm that combines data and bold thinking to improve the quality of people’s lives. We partner with clients and communities to advance equity and innovation—from creating scalable digital solutions and combatting infectious disease, to mitigating climate change and evaluating programs for measurable social impact. https://www.abtassociates.com

Abt contact:

Stan Crock
stan_crock@abtassoc.com

(301) 347-5402

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PHILADELPHIA, PA — HealthVerity, the leader in synchronizing transformational technologies and real-world data (RWD) to advance the science, today announced the launch of the expertly curated HealthVerity Mortality Masterset, powered by Veritas Data Research.

The solution synchronizes Veritas’ Fact of Death dataset, consisting of over 130 million death records from 1935 to today derived from more than 40,000 public and private sources, with a syndicate of open and closed medical claims assembled by HealthVerity from the nation’s largest de-identified healthcare and consumer data ecosystem. An advanced analytics engine empowered by deterministic and rules-based algorithms processes this synchronized data, retracing each patient’s medical history back 36 months prior from the date of passing, to determine the most likely primary and secondary causes of death. Additionally, each individual is de-identified using a universal HealthVerity ID that allows the Mortality Masterset to be seamlessly synchronized with other data sources for a comprehensive view of the patient journey.

It is important to know not just if a patient died, but whether the cause of death was from the disease being studied to better measure treatment efficacy and overall survival, address any safety issues, and make appropriate public health policy decisions. While cause of death is captured in death certificates that are collected by states and passed onto the CDC, access to these records is restricted, can take up to a year or more to receive, and they are not de-identified or interoperable. Additionally, the cause of death listed on the death certificate is often prone to error, with peer reviewed studies showing error rates ranging from 34% to 52% or even higher. Additionally, cardiac events are over reported on death certificates as a catchall when the true cause of death is unknown.

“Death is a critical endpoint in health research and related disciplines; however, the cause of death is rarely available in public notices and is often inaccurate in official death certificates,” explained Veritas CEO Jason LaBonte. “The Mortality Masterset offering is the first widely-accessible dataset to include cause of death for health research and risk modeling.”

“We saw a need amongst our clients in the life sciences industry to have an accurate cause of death for long-term follow up and health outcome studies, and we’re happy to be able to partner with Veritas to create the Mortality Masterset,” said Andrew Kress, HealthVerity CEO. “By synchronizing this breadth and depth of de-identified data, we are able to provide the most accurate, pre-assembled cause of death determination in a HIPAA-compliant format that allows our clients to start their studies immediately, without having to do additional research on the cause of death.”

The Mortality Masterset is an addition to the growing suite of HealthVerity Mastersets, including the Provider Diversity and Diagnosis Index (PDI) Masterset, Maternal Outcomes Masterset (MOM), Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) Masterset, and COVID-19 Masterset, all of which are curated by RWD experts to provide speed to insight for a particular area of study.

About HealthVerity

HealthVerity synchronizes transformational technologies with the nation’s largest healthcare and consumer data ecosystem to power previously unattainable outcomes and fundamentally advance the science. We offer a comprehensive, yet flexible approach, based on the foundational elements of Identity, Privacy, Governance and Exchange (IPGE), that synchronizes unparalleled Identity management with built-in Privacy compliance and Governance, providing the ability to discover and Exchange a near limitless combination of data at a record pace. Together with our partners in life sciences, government and insurance, we are Synchronizing the Science. To learn more about HealthVerity, visit healthverity.com.

About Veritas Data Research

Veritas makes critical information accessible. Founded by experts in the data and analytics industry, Veritas uses cutting-edge technology and efficient workflow design to collect, curate and distribute foundational reference datasets. To learn more about Veritas, visit https://veritasdataresearch.com/.

HealthVerity Contact:

Colleen Stoker
614-738-0592
cstoker@healthverity.com

Veritas Data Research Contact:

Jelita Victorson-Adams
jelita@veritasdataresearch.com

PHILADELPHIA, PA — HealthVerity, the leader in synchronizing transformational technologies and real-world data (RWD) to advance the science, is honored to partner with Gilead Sciences to support Women in Data Science (WiDS) for their 7th Annual Datathon Challenge. This year’s challenge, running from September 2023 through June 2024, will address the critical issue of equity in healthcare, specifically for women with metastatic triple negative breast cancer (metastatic TNBC), using RWD.

WiDS, launched at Stanford University in 2015, is an international initiative with a mission of increasing participation of women in all areas of data science. The Datathon is open to the public, giving students and practitioners the opportunity to discover and hone data science skills while solving interesting and critical social impact challenges using well-curated, real-world datasets. The advanced version of the Datathon may also be integrated into college and university courses.

During this year’s challenge, students across the country will use data science and machine learning to predict the time to treatment for women diagnosed with metastatic TNBC, an aggressive cancer that requires urgent and timely treatment. The students will develop models that predict timely treatment based on certain demographic characteristics. The lag time in receiving treatment is a good indicator of disparities in healthcare access. The students are also encouraged to generate additional insights to understand the real-world implications of their predictions.

The Datathon is sponsored by Gilead Sciences who partnered with HealthVerity to secure the curated RWD that the students will be using for the challenge. HealthVerity was able to provide a de-identified dataset of women diagnosed with metastatic TNBC between 2015 and 2018 that included the demographic characteristics needed to understand health equity, including insurance status and geo-demographic data that provides insight into socio-economic factors.

“Gilead worked closely with the Women in Data Science team to select HealthVerity’s dataset for the health equity Datathon due to our ongoing collaboration in using real-world data to ensure diverse representation in clinical trials,” explained Kelly Hoang Ph.D., data scientist and WiDS ambassador at Gilead Sciences. “Making the dataset available is globally part of Gilead’s commitment to diversity and inclusion of stakeholders in our ecosystem, including the data scientists in our industry.”

“HealthVerity is honored to partner with Gilead to use our vast RWD ecosystem and privacy-preserving technologies to support WiDS, help educate our nation’s future data scientists, and increase understanding of the critical issue of health equity and its impact on society,” said Andrew Kress, HealthVerity CEO.

About HealthVerity

HealthVerity synchronizes transformational technologies with the nation’s largest healthcare and consumer data ecosystem to power previously unattainable outcomes and fundamentally advance the science. We offer a comprehensive, yet flexible approach, based on the foundational elements of Identity, Privacy, Governance and Exchange (IPGE), that synchronizes unparalleled Identity management with built-in Privacy compliance and Governance, providing the ability to discover and Exchange a near limitless combination of data at a record pace. Together with our partners in life sciences, government and insurance, we are Synchronizing the Science. To learn more about HealthVerity, visit healthverity.com.

About Gilead Sciences

Gilead Sciences, Inc. is a biopharmaceutical company that has pursued and achieved breakthroughs in medicine for more than three decades, with the goal of creating a healthier world for all people. The company is committed to advancing innovative medicines to prevent and treat life-threatening diseases, including HIV, viral hepatitis, COVID-19, and cancer. Gilead operates in more than 35 countries worldwide, with headquarters in Foster City, California.

HealthVerity Contact:

Colleen Stoker
614-738-0592
cstoker@healthverity.com