Electronic Health Record Research

The Troiani Lab is embedded within Geisinger, an integrated health system in central Pennsylvania that treats nearly 3 million patients. Geisinger was one of the first hospitals to implement a digital health record (EHR) in 1996 and also has a data warehouse and infrastructure that supports translational research.  In the era of ‘big data’, the use of electronic health record data for neuroscience research represents an unprecedented opportunity. In addition to our work that uses EHR data to develop a clinical and genetic risk profile for opioid use disorder, we are using the EHR to build a program of research in several other domains.  One endeavor includes establishing the utility of using MRI data extracted from clinical records in group-level statistical analytic pipelines typically used in MRI research. The use of MRI data from clinically-ascertained images allows for association with an unlimited range of clinical diagnoses, including brain disorders and comorbidities. Ongoing work will also associate brain imaging findings from this MRI data with genetic data in these patients.