About the project
This PhD will use computer science and programming skills to integrate Big Data (digital healthcare records and genomics), developing and testing tools that guide clinical decisions for patients with inflammatory bowel disease. This project will centre on application of personalised, precision medicine, resulting in better outcomes and enabling application to other autoimmune conditions.
There is unprecedented potential to learn from existing patient data so we can:
- diagnose patients faster
- accurately define the specific molecular mechanism underlying disease
- predict outcomes or response to therapy
Application of artificial intelligence to these problems holds significant potential to unlock patient benefit.
Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a chronic and heterogenous inflammatory condition, comprising Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis. Within 10 years one in every 100 people in the United Kingdom will be living with IBD. About 20% to 25% of patients have disease onset during childhood and there is life-long morbidity, significant complication rates and huge opportunity to improve outcomes.
There is a concerted strategy to harness genomic technology to improve the health of the UK population through the NHS and Genomic Medicine Services. The aim is to become world-leading in generating vast genomic data on patients with rare and complex diseases.
This project will use computer science and programming skills to integrate digital healthcare and genomic data to develop and test informatic tools that guide clinical decisions. This will result in better outcomes for patients with IBD, and other autoimmune conditions.
You will work within trusted research environments, with the exciting opportunity to develop and optimise integration of genomic sequencing data with electronic healthcare records on patients from Southampton.
