The Program on Aging (POA) REDCap@Yale team has secured funding from an NIH Notice of Special Interest to support the enhancement of software tools for Open Science. In conjunction, the Yale Pepper Center has also granted two Development Projects awards to support this important work. With these funds, the POA software development team will make and distribute high-utility research support tools through the Vanderbilt Consortium REDCap library so that they can be downloaded and used anywhere, including the POA/Yale and YCCI/YNHH REDCap implementations.
These software support tools form an interoperable suite with features to help researchers manage studies. Collectively, these popular software tools are referred to as the Yale Study Support Suite (YES3).
“Over the course of his career, Peter Charpentier, the founding director of the Program on Aging Data Management and Informatics Core (DMIC), has collaborated with project directors, data managers and field staff to produce software systems for research support. His software tools have been critical to our most successful studies including PEP, PRIDE, TRIM, CRAN-DOSE, D-Care, STRIDE, SILVER-AMI, and GEARSS,” said Mary Geda, BSN, MSN, associate director of the program on aging. “These tools were originally built for aging-focused projects, but they have broad use and appeal. Our vision is to refine and refactor YES3 and make it available to anyone that wants to use it.”
YES3 is comprised of three components:
· The YES3 Dashboard is a powerful study operation support tool that provides configurable views of cross-sectional or longitudinal study data and tasks. It leverages the standard REDCap dashboard, while offering a substantial upgrade. Principal Investigators and study staff report that the YES3 Dashboard creates workflow efficiencies, highlights key information, and streamlines their work.
· The YES3 Study Portal serves as a central access point by providing an intranet platform to release communications, study documents, links to study support tools, and real-time performance reports. Principal Investigators and study staff report that a well-designed Study Portal makes information and resources accessible, which helps communication and study support, particularly for large multicenter studies.
· The YES3 Data Visualization will be designed and developed by the Yale OAIC Biostatistics Core under the leadership of Drs. Terrence Murphy and Brent Vander Wyk. It will integrate RStudio/RShiny graphical and data tabulation tools with REDCap study data to produce publication-ready tables and charts.
To aid in the rapid development of these software components and support our mission, the Yale Pepper Center and the REDCap@Yale team will support one student intern to be recruited from the Yale School of Public Health.
The mission of the Yale Pepper Center, established in 1992, is to provide intellectual leadership and innovation for aging research that is directed at enhancing the independence of older persons. To learn more visit the Yale Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center website.