EoE SNSDE for R&D - Solution to support data harmonisation, cohort discovery, de-identification, and linkage

Description

Summary of work We are looking for a solution which supports a federated approach to data harmonisation, cohort discovery and de-identification and linkage. During this engagement's proof of concept (POC) stages, this solution will operate on subsets of data from NHS data providers. This solution should be designed with the Office for National Statistics (ONS) Five Safes principle firmly at its core. We are looking for an approach which will promote interoperability, scalability and integration with NHS data provider systems. It should provide advanced yet user-friendly tooling to support research and innovation. The selected provider will adapt existing software to deliver a novel solution, alongside operational documentation, to create an extensible MVP within the SDE cloud-based environment and each NHS data provider’s own infrastructure. The solution will be adapted in partnership with the EoE SDE team and the NHS data provider Digital and Information Governance teams. This solution will enable researchers to discovery and gain approved access to a suitable cohort of patient data from the East of England and use it to better understand health care outcomes and drive forward new an innovative solutions while also meeting all information governance requirements. Where the supplied staff will work East of England Who the organisation using the products or services is The host Contracting Authority is Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. The East of England Collaborative Procurement Hub is working on behalf of the Contracting Authority. This is being procured for the East of England Integrated Care System: NHS CAMBRIDGESHIRE AND PETERBOROUGH (C&P) NHS NORFOLK AND WAVENEY (NWPC) NHS SUFFOLK AND NORTH EAST ESSEX (SNEE) NHS BEDFORDSHIRE, LUTON AND MILTON KEYNES (BLMK) NHS HERTFORDSHIRE AND WEST ESSEX (HWE) NHS MID AND SOUTH ESSEX (MSE) Why the work is being done Our vision is to deliver a Sub-National Secure Data Environment for Research and Development (SNSDE for R&D) for the East of England (EoE) that: 1. Accelerates research to improve the quality of life and reduce health inequalities for people living within our region, promoting the benefits to secure public advocacy and support. 2. Generates new opportunities for research by providing a simpler, faster, and streamlined research user journey while enhancing the quality and quantity of research – including integration with existing advanced, multimodal data assets. 3. Exemplifies patient and public involvement and engagement in research by working with patients and the public in progressive ways to shape local research efforts, thereby enhancing public trust in how their data is used and protected. 4. Drives economic growth by contributing to the attractiveness of the East of England as a place where life science and tech companies want to locate and fund research. 5. Delivers a technical solution which takes measures to minimise its environmental footprint. The East of England is home to a world-renowned clinical, academic, and life sciences community. It is well-placed to harness longitudinal healthcare data at scale to deliver research and innovation that transforms health outcomes. The existing SDE can provide Project Research Environments (PRE) where Researchers can interact via a Virtual Desktop Interface. The SDE platform design is based on the Standardised Architecture for Trusted Research Environments (SATRE). This interface currently provides Researchers with: • Access to their approved research cohort, which is created via a manual process. • Access to software libraries via package managers like PyPI and CRAN. • The ability to ingress de-identified anonymised data to use alongside the approved research cohort, which is de-identified at source. • The ability to egress anonymised results with oversight by an SDE Data manager. The business problem We are looking for a solution which supports a federated approach to data harmonisation, cohort discovery and de-identification and linkage. During this engagement's proof of concept (POC) stages, this solution will operate on subsets of data from NHS data providers. This solution should be designed with the Office for National Statistics (ONS) Five Safes principle firmly at its core. We are looking for an approach which will promote interoperability, scalability and integration with NHS data provider systems. It should provide advanced yet user-friendly tooling to support research and innovation. The primary needs of these POCs and Minimal Viable Product (MVP) will need to fulfil are: • Data Harmonisation: Electronic Patient Record (EPR) and other data from NHS data provider organisations will be mapped to the OMOP common data model and vocabulary to provide researchers with a shared language when using these data. • Cohort discovery: To support researchers in exploring whether the East of England NHS data providers have enough patients to meet their research requirements. • De-identification and linkage: To remove and/or minimise personally identifiable information in the selected/approved cohorts being surfaced on EOE-SDE to meet information governance rules and guidelines and provision harmonised data with OMOP schema, original records and transformation scripts within a researcher’s Project Research Environment (PRE) on the SDE. The chosen partner must work with the SDE technical team and NHS data providers to develop and deliver a synthetic data POC by 28 February 2025, a live data POC by 31 March and then the MVP production service by 30 June 2025. The people who will use the product or service User type: Personas and User Stories Definition: Descriptions of personas and user stories can be found in 00_EoE-SNSDE_Data_harmonisation_Ptr_spec, Appendix 1, SDE Personas and User stories. Which phase the project is in Beta Existing team Description and organigram of the existing team is set out in Appendix 3 SDE Delivery Team Information. Address where the work will be done Remote plus some in person meetings at: Health Innovation East, Unit C, Magog Court, Shelford Bottom, Cambridge, CB22 3AD Working arrangements The supplier team is expected to keep to the delivery team's core working hours (09:00-17:00), to maximise knowledge transfer and time available to work collaboratively across organisations. As a minimum we require the supplier to engage with fortnightly sprint cycles, with two stand-ups per week with the SDE programme management office (PMO) and technical teams. Work is expected to be conducted largely remotely, but the supplier team will need to be able to travel to the Health Innovation East office (in Cambridge) as some in person meetings are expected. Reasonable travel expenses (excluding air travel due to carbon impact) to support the working arrangements will be reimbursed, subject to prior approval. EOECPH and the Trusts shall not be liable for or pay any costs, expenses or losses, whatsoever which may be incurred by any Tenderer in the preparation of their Tender submission. Security and vetting requirements No security clearance needed Latest start date 5 December 2024 Expected contract length Contract length: 0 years 6 months 0 days Optional extension: 0 years 3 months 0 days Budget Indicative maximum: The contract value is not specified by the buyer Indicative minimum: The contract value is not specified by the buyer Contracted out service or supply of resource? Contracted out service: the off-payroll rules do not apply Terms and acronyms Term or acronym: EoE Definition: East of England Term or acronym: SDE Definition: Secure Data Environment Term or acronym: PRE Definition: Project Research Environment, the area a approved research can use to interact with their approved data via a virtual data interface Term or acronym: OMOP Definition: Observational Medical Outcomes Partnership Term or acronym: EPR Definition: Electronic Patient Record Term or acronym: CDM Definition: Common Data Model Term or acronym: UAT Definition: User Acceptance Testing Term or acronym: ETL Definition: Extract, Transform, Load, a pipeline to extract data from multiple locations, transform it and load it into a new data warehouse Term or acronym: POC Definition: Proof of Concept Term or acronym: MVP Definition: Minimum Viable Product Questions and Clarifications 1. You are asking suppliers to keep the tender documentation confidential. Can we share the tender documentation with potential technology partners or sub-contractors? We can confirm that the tender documentation can be shared with technology partners or sub-contractors, however any partners engaged must keep the documentation confidential and not share with any other parties. Last Updated : <strong>16/09/2024</strong> 2. What is the anticipated budget envelope? We are not able to share the budget envelope for this project. Pricing proposals should be submitted by shortlisted bidders as part of their stage 2 responses. Last Updated : <strong>16/09/2024</strong> 3. Who delivered the Discovery and Alpha stages? Following a procurement exercise, Kainos Software Limited were awarded the contract to design and build the MVP for the East of England Secure Data Environment. What they, with close collaboration and involvement of AWS Professional Services, have delivered is covered in section 1.2 of 00_EoE-SNSDE_Data_harmonisation_Ptr_spec. As this engagement will combine the MVP SDE platform and existing functionality from the chosen partner, we felt this best matched the beta definition from https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/agile-delivery#phases-of-an-agile-project Last Updated : <strong>16/09/2024</strong> 4. Which assets are required to be live by March? By March, we expect regional data assets, particularly secondary care, from trusts within the East of England region. Last Updated : <strong>17/09/2024</strong> 5. Do you plan to onboard national assets by March? This work is focussed on supporting cohort discovery across participating NHS Trusts in the region. We may separately bring in national data assets to the EoE SDE in this timeframe, but they are out of scope for this discovery infrastructure work. Last Updated : <strong>17/09/2024</strong>