The Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF)-funded Medical Informatics Initiative (MII) for data-driven health research will enter the expansion and expansion phase early this year.
Federal Research Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger explains:
“Data helps heal. That is why we are pursuing digitalisation in health research with determination and are financing the expansion and expansion phase of the medical informatics initiative until 2026 with around 200 million euros. Our goal is to make MII the engine and driving force of a decentralized research data infrastructure for healthcare data that meets all data protection and IT security requirements. The benefits of our financing are diverse: For example, digital care systems can automatically analyze drug prescriptions and routine clinical data. If you discover an increased risk of unwanted side effects, tell your hospital ward pharmacist. In the future, such IT solutions will help in all areas of medicine to improve our healthcare and save lives.”
background
The Medical Informatics Initiative (MII) has been building data infrastructures at teaching hospitals since 2018. The MII partners have already demonstrated the added value of their IT solutions in practice using a wide range of applications, from intensive care to oncology medicine.
The core of the expansion and expansion phase (2023-2026), which is now launched and financed with around 200 million euros, is an extended cooperation between the university hospitals and their cooperation with new partners, especially from the healthcare sector regional.
An important component of this infrastructure is the Health Research Data Portal (FDGP). It is not only intended to serve as a central point of contact for MII partners, but for all researchers who wish to use biological data and samples from university medicine. At the same time, the FDPG is aimed at citizens. It makes it transparent which projects are researching patient data and what the results are.
In addition, the BMBF is funding six Digital Progress Hubs Health with approximately €50 million (2021-2025) as part of the MII. Its task is to bring the pioneering work of the MII into other areas of the health system: from outpatient assistance in the family doctor’s office, to assistance in rehabilitation and treatment facilities.
Additional information
www.bmbf.de/medizininformatik-initiative
www.forschen-fuer-gesundheit.de
