Research Advocate Seana Roubinek attended the 2015 American Association of Cancer Research Annual Meeting in April. Here is her report: “As a two-time cancer ovarian cancer survivor, I have had the great opportunity to get involved in legislative advocacy as well as the Survivors Teaching Students® program through the Ovarian Cancer National Alliance. Being selected to participate in the Survivor-Scientist Program with the American Association for Cancer Research was a new opportunity for me to venture into research advocacy.” Click plus sign to read more.
This year’s annual conference focused largely on Big Data and patient-targeted therapies including genome sequencing and immunotherapy. Big Data is the massive amounts of useful data that are generated every day by cancer researchers around the world. However, due to the volume, its complexity and lack of centralization leaves much of it unanalyzed. There are no consistent standards for gathering, maintaining, and mining through the information. In addition, the smaller institutions that are performing research do not have access to the data. Big data presents a great opportunity for researchers if there is a way to share all of the information that is gathered while maintaining patient privacy.
To read Seana’s entire report, click here.
