I work in Medical Devices. In one of my jobs, the goal was to collect blood products - Platelets, Plasma, RBCs and keep WBCs at bay - using centrifugal separation. The 'prediction' algorithms would make a best effort prediction on how fast (and when) to run the various mechanical components - the Centrifuge, Platelet, Plasma and RBC pumps to optimally collect these products with minimum variability.
Luckily they had the foresight and technical chops to build and collect every little detail about how the devices ran, under what inputs etc. Access to the 'outcome' of the treatment was tricky - the hospitals/collection centers had to actually measure the actual platelet counts and make sure they enter it into their system. What I'm getting at is that there is a trove of data in Medical Devices - if there isn't, hopefully companies will start collecting data with a view to applying machine learning a few years down the line - and given the complexity of some of the problems, this would be a great field for application.
A couple of years back, there was also talk of Pharmaceutical companies opening up their data for clinical trials. I'm not sure where things are with that effort. If anyone has any info on that, it would be good to know.
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I work in Medical Devices. In one of my jobs, the goal was to collect blood products - Platelets, Plasma, RBCs and keep WBCs at bay - using centrifugal separation. The 'prediction' algorithms would make a best effort prediction on how fast (and when) to run the various mechanical components - the Centrifuge, Platelet, Plasma and RBC pumps to optimally collect these products with minimum variability. Luckily they had the foresight and technical chops to build and collect every little detail about how the devices ran, under what inputs etc. Access to the 'outcome' of the treatment was tricky - the hospitals/collection centers had to actually measure the actual platelet counts and make sure they enter it into their system. What I'm getting at is that there is a trove of data in Medical Devices - if there isn't, hopefully companies will start collecting data with a view to applying machine learning a few years down the line - and given the complexity of some of the problems, this would be a great field for application.
A couple of years back, there was also talk of Pharmaceutical companies opening up their data for clinical trials. I'm not sure where things are with that effort. If anyone has any info on that, it would be good to know.