BMFTR kick-off event for the National Decade against Cancer projects

From left to right: Dr. Mario A. Cypko, Dr. Andrea Proaño Vasco,  Dr. Marcus Säbel, Prof. Michael Quante.

Togehter with a part of the KI-COMPASS team, including Dr. Andrea Proaño Vasco and  Prof. Michael Quante (both from Medical Center - University of Freiburg), Dr. Marcus Säbel (BiSIGMA) and me (Hahn-Schickard), we recently had the opportunity to take part in the BMFTR kick-off event that brought together all five projects selected within the current funding context of the National Decade against Cancer.

The projects differ in their concrete medical focus, but they also share important common ground. Across the funding line, the selected initiatives address constellations in which an underlying cancer disease and its therapies may affect the cardiovascular system, while smartwatch-based telemedical monitoring and AI-supported analysis are explored as part of future follow-up care.

For me, the event was highly valuable for two reasons. First, it created a very good overview of the broader project landscape. Second, it enabled early exchange on questions that are highly relevant across all projects, especially the structured collection and processing of wearable and clinical data.

I came away with the strong impression that KI-COMPASS is very well positioned within this landscape. The project combines a clear medical focus with an ambitious, but realistic, technical and methodological agenda. In particular, I see great strength in the way KI-COMPASS brings together wearable-based monitoring, clinical data integration, AI methods, and model-oriented thinking in one coherent framework.

One topic that quickly emerged as a shared cross-project challenge was the question of data structures and minimum requirements: Which smartwatch and clinical data are collected across the projects, in what level of detail, and with which temporal resolution?

Establishing more alignment here could become highly valuable in the long term, both for comparing findings across medical domains and for enabling broader forms of reuse or federated collaboration where appropriate.

I was therefore very pleased that first concrete exchanges already began during the event. Together with colleagues from other projects, an initial small task force was formed to identify common questions and possible first steps for collaboration around data acquisition, processing, and interoperability. From the perspective of KI-COMPASS, this is especially relevant because the involvement of the Data Integration Center creates an opportunity not only to develop robust internal solutions, but also to contribute recommendations that may be useful across projects, particularly for the long-term handling of wearable data.

I am very much looking forward to the next project steps, both within KI-COMPASS and in exchange with the other funded initiatives. I also hope to share more regular insights in the future, including from meetings, collaborations, and methodological development.