The term ‘bioinformatician’ is often used flexibly to describe someone working in a broad range of clinical or research ‘informatics’ domains. Originally describing the study of informatics processes in biotic systems1, bioinformatics today is a broad, interdisciplinary field that integrates principles from computer science, mathematics and statistics in order to manage, mine, visualize and analyse biological data. Bioinformatics has effectively co-evolved with disciplines such as genomics, and is now viewed as an integral component of these fields in academia.
The number of healthcare organisations facing big data challenges, for example analysing genome sequence data, is also increasing rapidly. The consequent escalation in demand for the skills of bioinformaticians has not, however, always been matched by an increase in understanding of the capabilities and limitations of bioinformatics, or by preparedness for integration of this new class of healthcare scientists into the workforce.
What then are the varied roles of bioinformaticians and what do UK health services need to do to maximise their skills for better, more effective patient care?
No comments:
Post a Comment