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Yoav Gilad, PhD, Appointed Dean for Biomedical and Health Informatics

By News

Yoav Gilad, PhD, Professor of Medicine, Vice Chair for Research and Chief of the Section of Genetic Medicine, has been appointed as Dean for Biomedical and Health Informatics in the Biological Science Division effective July 1, 2021.  The creation of this new position by Dean Kenneth Polonsky recognizes the essential contributions that data, information, and computer sciences make in the  understanding of biology, medicine and the enhanced delivery of health care services.

Working closely with group leaders in the Center for Research Informatics (CRI) and with faculty throughout the BSD and University, Dr. Gilad will focus initially on the development of a plan to update and repurpose (as necessary) the CRI as a state-of-the-art research-informatics support facility whose staff and resources are strategically focused to support our division’s highest priorities.

Read more about Dr. Gilad’s new role here.

New REDCap Features

By News, REDCap

REDCap has been successfully upgraded to version LTS 11.1.7. Details of the newest features and improvements can be found here. In addition to many new features and improvements, some highlights include:

  • Field Embedding
  • Project Dashboards
  • Smart Functions
  • Smart Tables
  • Smart Charts
  • DAG Switcher
  • Record Level Locking
  • Project Life Cycles
  • Special Functions
  • Field Bank
  • Edit Multiple Fields
  • Logic Editor
  • Text-to-Speech New Languages

Please contact REDCap Support with any questions.

Dipti Ranganathan departs for new UChicago role

By News

Executive Director Dipti Ranganathan will now serve as the University of Chicago’s first Chief Privacy Officer (CPO). As CPO, Dipti will collaborate with University stakeholders to build and manage a privacy and data governance program, addressing administrative and research data. A national search for Dipti’s permanent successor as CRI Director will be launched soon, engaging multiple stakeholders across the Division. On an interim basis, CRI will be overseen by Julie Johnson, Associate Director of Clinical Research Informatics.

Zoom Seminar: Electronic Informed Consent (eIC) in Research

By News, REDCap

Date and Time: Wednesday, January 27, 2020 9:00 AM – 10:30 AM

Description: This session will provide an overview of regulatory guidelines, requirements, and implementation processes for eIC. It will also provide an overview of the REDCap processes and functionality for eIC. This training is recommended for individuals who would like to get familiar with the Electronic Informed Consent (eIC) process.

Speakers:
James Lynch
BSD IRB, Associate Director of Education/Quality Assurance
Julissa Acevedo
BSD CRI, REDCap Administrator/Senior Systems Analyst

Offered by: Office of Clinical Research and Center for Research Informatics

Registration: https://bsdocr.bsd.uchicago.edu/fac-staff/education/registration-request/fundamentals.html
Zoom link will be provided upon registration.

Contact: Margaret Wieczorek
mwieczor@bsd.uchicago.edu
773-834-2860

Images Now Available in CRI COVID Data Mart

By News

In collaboration with the Human Imaging Research Office (HIRO), the CRI is for the first time making images available in our COVID-19 limited data mart. In addition to the structured data already in this data mart, which includes patient demographics, encounters, diagnoses, labs, medications, flow sheets, and procedures, researchers will now have access to HIRO imaging data. Chest radiographs are currently available, and chest CT scans will be added soon. These images are in the DICOM format, and access requires IRB approval for use of the limited data mart.

More information about these images is available in our Medical Imaging Tip Sheet. If you have any questions, please reach out to Julie Johnson at jjohnso3@bsd.uchicago.edu or join us for online office hours.

REDCap New Features

By News, REDCap

REDCap has been successfully upgraded to version 9.5.6. Listed below are the newest features. Click here to learn more about these new features and many other improvements.

  • Alerts & Notifications – The Alerts & Notifications feature allows you to construct alerts and send customized email notifications. These notifications may be sent to one or more recipients and can be triggered or scheduled when a form/survey is saved and/or based on conditional logic whenever data is saved or imported.
  • Rich Text Editor – Users may optionally utilize the rich text editor for styling field labels or section headers with many text-formatting options; available for any field on an instrument, survey invitations, and survey confirmation emails.
  • Missing Data Codes – Fields that have a blank/missing value may be marked with a custom ‘Missing Data Code’ to note why the value is blank. These missing codes may be used to aid in data analysis by specifying why a field lacks a value.
  • File Version History for File Upload Fields – This feature allows a new file to be uploaded onto a File Upload field that already has a file uploaded for it. If a file has already been uploaded, the field will have a new link “Upload new version”, and after being clicked, it will allow the user to upload another file without having to delete the existing one.
  • New Action Tag @HIDDEN-PDF – Hides the field only in the downloaded PDF of one or more instruments (including blank PDFs, PDFs with data, and compact PDFs with data).
  • New API Method “Import Repeating Instruments and Events” – Allows users to import a list of the repeated instruments and repeating events for a project as a means of setting which instruments and events should be repeatable.

Please contact REDCap Support with any questions.

REDCap Downtime and Upgrade

By News, REDCap

System: REDCap https://redcap.uchicago.edu

Date/Time: Wednesday, February 5th, 2020, 5PM-7PM

Who Is Affected: All UChicago REDCap users, including non-UChicago external collaborators, mobile app users, API users, survey participants

Impact: REDCap will be unavailable during this time in order to upgrade to a new version of the software.

  • Survey emails will be halted until the upgrade is complete.
  • Survey links will be inaccessible and will display a REDCap is offline message when clicked on.
  • Mobile app users are STRONGLY encouraged to sync any data on their devices back to their REDCap project BEFORE the upgrade begins. Although not encouraged, offline data collection may continue in the app during the upgrade, however the online sync process will not be available until the upgrade is complete.

At approximately 7PM (or sooner), another email will be sent confirming the upgrade completion, and details of the newest features and functionality.

Questions? Please email REDCap Support.

CRI Seminar Series returns for 2019-2020

By News

The CRI’s annual series of free training sessions in informatics research tools and techniques returns for the 2019-2020 academic year with a schedule focused around the popular topics of REDCap, high performance computing (HPC), and clinical data analytics. Julissa Acevedo will teach her annual trio of sessions in various aspects of REDCap in November, February, and April, beginning with an introduction to the basics. The CRI’s Manager of Scientific Computing Mike Jarsulic will offer an overview of CRI computing infrastructure in January and an HPC tutorial to coincide with a planned upgrade in May. In March, Tomasz Oliwa, PhD, and Brian Furner will present a session in how to enhance clinical data analytics with the technique of natural language processing.

View the schedule here, and make sure to sign up for the email list to be notified when seminars are available for registration!