Dr Lydia Drumright (University of Cambridge, Department of Medicine)

The Ethics of Big Data topic on ‘Patient Record Linkage in Hospitals’ will start with an introduction of some of the current activities and debates around Big Data in Health with respect to ethical and legal considerations. We will then focus on an all participant discussion of four key areas surround the Ethics of Big Data with respect to routinely collected medical data, with a particular focus on research including:

• Consent, anonymization and opting in/out
• Data sharing and data ownership
• Data protection laws and ethics around use of patient data
• Societal vs. individual protection and benefit

Participants will have the opportunity to discuss and debate the complex depth of issues surrounding these key areas. We will explore first-hand the vast ‘grey areas’ in the ethics of use of patient data and consider how to tackle this very real future issue. 

Reading list will be published shortly.