“Big Data” has become a commonly used catchphrase in recent years, as reliance on computer technology has spread across financial, retail, communications, record management, and other sectors. The term refers to the collection, management, and storage of vast amounts of data – defined by Wikipedia as ‘data sets so large or complex that traditional data processing applications are inadequate.’
The growth and management of big data has significant implications for health research and practice, and in a recent series of publications, Cochrane contributors consider the opportunities and challenges:
“A new Science(ability)?”, Gerd Antes, Lab Times online, 2 November 2015
“Make sense of health data”, Julian Elliott, Jeremy Grimshaw and colleagues, Nature, 5 November 2015
