New effort underway to help people living with epilepsy

The Interoperability and Integration Innovation Lab at the Georgia Institute of Technology (I3L) and UCB, a global biopharmaceutical company, announced today a new collaboration to explore how predictive analytics can help inform treatment decisions for people living with epilepsy.

The goal is to develop an interactive system that can convert large amounts of anonymous patient data into real-time insights that health care providers can consult at the point-of-care to inform treatment decisions.

Epilepsy, one of the most common diseases of the central nervous system, affects approximately 65 million people worldwide and more than 2 million people in the United States.

UCB will contribute its expertise as a leader in epilepsy treatment and access to large sets of epilepsy data. I3L will supply access to an extensive collection of health IT resources as well as collaborators who are experts at connecting critical data to electronic heath records systems. 

“The innovative nature of this project reflects UCB and the I3L’s shared goal of delivering more patient-centric health solutions in Georgia and beyond,” said Mark Braunstein, one of the I3L’s founders and associate director of Georgia Tech’s Health Systems Institute. “We believe that by arming physicians with insights to help them identify the best possible treatment options for people living with epilepsy, we can help drive better patient outcomes and deliver a higher standard of epilepsy care.”

This project represents an important next step in UCB’s efforts to harness predictive analytics to raise the standard of epilepsy care.

“UCB emphasizes the creation of innovative networks of expert partners, both here in Atlanta and around the world, because we understand that collaboration is a most efficient way to deliver transformative solutions for people living with severe diseases,” said Jeff Wren, president of UCB North America. “By marrying big data and predictive analytics, we may be able to develop a system that physicians can consult in the clinic to help provide more personalized epilepsy treatment selections.”

UCB’s North America Operations are headquartered in Atlanta.

The UCB-Georgia Tech collaboration represents I3L’s commitment to work closely with industry to reduce costs while improving patient experiences and the health of populations, said Margaret Wagner Dahl, associate vice president for Health IT at Georgia Tech.