Lars Halvorsen, an edenceHealth Managing Director and Jared Houghtaling, an edenceHealth Data Scientist, shared insights learned from the LAISDAR (Leveraging AI in SARS COVID-2/COVID-19 Data in Rwanda) project, which was launched in late 2020 and wrapped up in June 2023.
The project came in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The LAISDAR federated data network (FDN) of 15 hospitals was established in Rwanda. A Consortium was created and led by the University of Rwanda, Ghent University, and the Rwanda Biomedical Centre. Belgium-based edenceHealth’s role was to design and implement the technical solution - the first time an EHDEN SME has worked with Data Partners in Africa.
The overarching objective was to map and leverage the FDN’s data sets, extended with data from centralised COVID-19 test results and survey data, to support the Rwandan government’s needs in monitoring and predicting the COVID-19 burden. A central LAISDAR server was also set up and training was provided.
Funding is currently being sourced to build on the significant foundational work done during this project.