HeSANDA

Published on:

SHP and the NHMRC Clinical Trials Centre (CTC) at the University of Sydney lead the Sydney Node Project of the Health Studies Australian National Data Asset (HeSANDA) program.

What is HeSANDA?

HeSANDA is a program of the Australian Research Data Commons (ARDC) that aims to build the national infrastructure required to support the sharing and reuse of health research data in a way that would bring value to the research community, increase the efficiency of research, and provide benefits for the health of Australia’s population.

The program is starting with a focus on sharing and re-using data that has been collected through investigator-initiated clinical trials, but hopes to expand to include other types of research data in the future.

To date, nine nodes (clusters or research organisations) have been approved to be involved in the development of the HeSANDA initiative by ARDC, including SHP-CTC/Sydney Node. Other key stakeholders from ANZCTR, the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, and the Australian Data Archive are also contributing to this initiative.

Focus of the Sydney Node

Current work is focusing on the systems and processes that will enable findability and accessibility of clinical trial study data. The Sydney Node is developing:

  • Data repository (hosted by the University of Sydney) to securely store high-level descriptive clinical trials information (i.e. study protocol, data dictionary, publications) for trials that may be available for data sharing
  • Data request system to review data access requests and allow data sharing.

    • Data Sharing and Health Data Australia

    The benefits of securely sharing clinical trial data for secondary use are manifold, including fostering richer datasets, inspiring new research questions and hypotheses, and conserving resources by reducing duplication. Watch the below videos from the Australian Research Data Commons (ARDC), Australia’s leading research data infrastructure facility, and find out more about:

  • the benefits of data sharing and secondary data use through the Health Data Australia platform
  • what HeSANDA initiative is and what the Health Data Australia platform can offer your research
  • the process of sharing clinical trial data using the Health Data Australia platform
  • the importance of metadata in health and medical research.

    • Benefits of Data Sharing

    What is Health Data Australia?

    Setting up a New Clinical Trial for Data Sharing

    Why is Metadata Important for Research?

    Managing Data Requests

    The data request workflow outlines the data infrastructure components that the Federation Service, Nodes and ANZCTR provide as part of the HeSANDA system. Watch the video to learn how to use the flowchart to efficiently manage data requests using Health Data Australia.

    Data Request Workflow

    How Can You Contribute?

    If you are a Principal Investigator who is interested in learning more about sharing your clinical trial data, please contact the Sydney Node Project Manager, Talia Palacios: talia.palacios@sydney.edu.au

    Funding

    The Sydney node of the HeSANDA project received investment (doi.org/10.47486/HS002) from the Australian Research Data Commons. The ARDC is funded by the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy.

    HeSANDA Event Resources

    Sharing is caring: enabling the sharing of research data

    On 28 May 2024, Sydney Health Partners and NHMRC Clinical Trials Centre (University of Sydney) co-hosted a webinar to share information about the national program Health Studies Australian National Data Asset (HeSANDA)  and its role in helping to support more sharing of clinical trial data for secondary use. The event was targeted at researchers, data custodians, members of the clinical trials community, and anyone interested in how to maximise the potential of health research data through sharing.

    The event included presentations giving an overview of HeSANDA on national and local levels as well as case study examples or re-using research data.

    Please find the slides of the event and a recording of the 90-minute webinar available for download on the right.

    Read more about the event, the benefits of data sharing and using secondary data to drive real-world impact in this article on the ARDC website.