Here’s a look at the overall timeline for the project.
April to June 2020: Project Initiation
- Solicited and secured project participation from 21 health systems
- Defined project parameters including providing electronic health record (EHR) data for all patients with a COVID case starting on February 1, 2020
- Obtained University of Wisconsin (UW) IRB Exemption approval for project
- Identified discrete EHR data elements of interest (about 195 elements), all of which are HIPAA-compliant and de-identified (per HIPAA requirements)
- Provided a unique de-identified patient identifier for each patient included in the cohort. The unique identifier allows for tracking of additional treatments provided by the same health system after the initial COVID diagnosis
- Completed data transfer and use agreements with each of the 21 health systems
- Contracted with BlueTree to consult on use of EHR data
- Defined a COVID case as PCR+ for COVID and/or ICD-10 Code+ for COVID and/or Antibody+ for COVID
July to September 2020: Initiated Data Extraction
- Assisted health systems with EHR coding and extraction
- Completed first monthly data transfer from 21 health systems (data from February 1 – June 30, 2020) in early July
- Corrected and refined EHR coding across the 21 health systems
- Aided each health system with unique EHR data challenges (ongoing)
- Merged data across 21 health systems to evaluate summary data for the first time
October to December 2020: Continued Data Extraction and Produced first Analyzable Data Set Findings
- February – October 2020 data from 21 health systems was merged and reviewed for integrity and quality. Corrections to data inaccuracies were made
- EHR code was refined and optimized
- Began testing analyses with harmonized data set
- Invited co-investigators to submit research ideas
**2020 total sample size – approximately 620,000 discrete patients with COVID case
2021 (Planned Activities)
- Complete data collection from 21 health systems for 2020 (February 1 – December 31, 2020)
- Finalize data dictionary
- Solicit participation from the same 21 health systems to continue project in calendar year 2021
- Prepare and submit first manuscripts
CEC-UW Essentials
