FAIR principles to improve the impact on health research management outcomes

Alicia Martínez-García; Celia Alvarez-Romero; Esther Román-Villarán; Máximo Bernabeu-Wittel; Carlos Luis Parra-Calderón

doi:10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e15733

FAIR principles to improve the impact on health research management outcomes

Heliyon. 2023 May 3;9(5):e15733. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e15733. eCollection 2023 May.

Authors

Alicia Martínez-García¹, Celia Alvarez-Romero¹, Esther Román-Villarán¹, Máximo Bernabeu-Wittel², Carlos Luis Parra-Calderón¹

Affiliations

¹ Computational Health Informatics Group, Institute of Biomedicine of Seville, IBiS/Virgen del Rocío University Hospital/CSIC/University of Seville, Seville, Spain.
² Internal Medicine Department, Virgen del Rocío University Hospital, Seville, Spain.

Abstract

Background: The FAIR principles, under the open science paradigm, aim to improve the Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability and Reusability of digital data. In this sense, the FAIR4Health project aimed to apply the FAIR principles in the health research field. For this purpose, a workflow and a set of tools were developed to apply FAIR principles in health research datasets, and validated through the demonstration of the potential impact that this strategy has on health research management outcomes.

Objective: This paper aims to describe the analysis of the impact on health research management outcomes of the FAIR4Health solution.

Methods: To analyse the impact on health research management outcomes in terms of time and economic savings, a survey was designed and sent to experts on data management with expertise in the use of the FAIR4Health solution. Then, differences between the time and costs needed to perform the techniques with (i) standalone research, and (ii) using the proposed solution, were analyzed.

Results: In the context of the health research management outcomes, the survey analysis concluded that 56.57% of the time and 16800 EUR per month could be saved if the FAIR4Health solution is used.

Conclusions: Adopting principles in health research through the FAIR4Health solution saves time and, consequently, costs in the execution of research involving data management techniques.

Keywords: Data management; Economic savings; FAIR principles; Health research management; Survey; Time investment.