Biotech companies are starting to accumulate Big Data, consisting of gene expression profiles, biomarker reliability, patient outcomes and numerous other measurable aspects of drug development. The hope is that the mass amount of data can help streamline R&D. During the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference, FierceBiotech Executive Editor Ryan McBride asked a panel of drug development executives about the potential applications and implementation of Big Data in drug development. The bioteh executives discussed the pros and cons of using Big Data to generate hypotheses, and how Big Data can be used to target the right patients for the right drug trial. Another issue discussed was the unstructured, handwritten notes taken by physicians and the challenge of merging and indexing this data with the newly collected high tech data. Nevertheless, the executives agreed at the conference that Big Data is a great source of information for R&D, provided one knows how to use it, and it is just a matter of time before R&D companies do what is necessary to merge all the data into one integrated system. To read the full article on FierceBiotech, click here.
