On Wednesday 17 September 2025, we hosted our webinar Transforming Cancer Data: Lessons from NHS trusts and Flatiron Health on creating research-ready datasets. The session brought together Flatiron Health UK’s Dr Arun Sujenthiran with special guests from our NHS partners in Leeds, Leicester and Newcastle to explore what it takes to transform fragmented, messy real-world data into high-quality, research-ready datasets.
Flatiron Health, a leading healthtech company dedicated to improving cancer care and advancing research using real-world data (RWD), today announced that its international oncology research network has tripled in size across the UK, Germany, and Japan over the past year—a milestone that marks an unprecedented acceleration in global cancer research collaboration and impact.
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The collaborations will use existing data to expand research, support innovation and improve services for patients. As one of the largest NHS organisations in the country, Newcastle Hospitals hold huge amounts of data on care, treatment, outcomes and services. This information is currently stored in different locations and on a range of software systems, making it difficult to collate, organise and use in the best possible way.
University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust, one of the largest acute hospital trusts in the UK, has partnered with Flatiron Health UK to translate Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland’s cancer patient records into high-quality data to expand cancer research opportunities. Increased access to cancer data will further increase possibilities in developing and improving cancer care and treatment for patients in the UK.
Nearly 1 in 2 people will be diagnosed with cancer during their lifetime and survival rates in the UK are falling behind other comparable countries. Given the scale and impact of cancer, research has huge potential to transform care and outcomes. High-quality research depends on the availability of high-quality data, which provides a complete and recent picture of the patient journey; is accurate and traceable to source; and is representative of the broader population. Lower-quality data serves limited research questions or may even lead to unreliable insights.
By Adam Manhi, Head of Network and Commercial Partnerships at Flatiron Health UK
By Bob White, written in collaboration with Emily Bridges (PVP)
We asked Adam Manhi – Head of Strategic Partnerships at Flatiron Health UK – why he believes data collaborations with the NHS are needed, and how he feels they can benefit NHS Trusts and care systems, their patients, and the wider UK cancer population.
We asked Arun Sujenthiran – UK Clinical Lead, Senior Medical Director and Caldicott Guardian at Flatiron Health – from the perspective of a clinician and real-world data expert, why he believes data collaborations with the NHS are needed, and why he’s so excited about the subsequent benefits to patients, their care teams and NHS hospitals.
Today, the experiences of only a small percentage of cancer patients are represented in the clinical trials that currently form the evidence base for most treatment, drug development and regulatory decisions. Flatiron Health UK helps to fill this gap by transforming information from electronic health records into high-quality real-world evidence (RWE) that helps address new and previously hard to answer questions.
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New collaboration between Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust and Flatiron Health UK plans to utilise cancer data to expand research and improve care for UK cancer patients
Helen Bulbeck, member of Flatiron Health UK’s Patient Voices Panel and Co-Founder of brainstrust, who has experienced cancer as both a patient and a caregiver
Today, 31 May 2023, Lifebit and Flatiron Health are announcing a multi-year strategic partnership to support vital research and enable scientific discoveries to improve and extend lives by learning from the experience of every person with cancer. Implementing Lifebit’s pioneering federated Trusted Research Environment technology will enable approved researchers to safely and securely access high-quality real-world data on cancer patients to enable breakthrough analysis globally.
Lesley Shannon is a member of the Flatiron Health UK’s Patient Voices Panel (PVP). She joined the panel with a desire to learn more about how real-world patient data can be used for the good of cancer patients in the UK. She is a member of the National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) and a part of a Cross Party Group In The Scottish Parliament on Cancer.
In the final episode of this ResearchX season, which aired in May 2022, we saw a panel discussion about patient perspectives on a range of topics at the forefront of evidence generation.
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Flatiron Health CEO Carolyn Starrett spoke at the HLTH 2022 conference about why embracing data and technology is critical to moving cancer care and research forward. Here is the transcript of her speech:
Unlocking the UK’s health datasets for research and discovery. As the UK research community starts to bring together the vast quantity of health datasets and make those datasets more widely available for health research, there is a growing need to define, categorise and curate that data. See how Flatiron Health UK is helping play a part.
ISPOR Europe 2021 Clinical trials are an important source of evidence for health technology appraisals (HTA). However, a key concern is uncertainty in survival due to immature data. This case study developed by Flatiron Health UK in collaboration with NICE demonstrates how electronic health record (EHR)-derived data from the US can help to reduce uncertainty in long-term outcomes.
Responsible collection and use of big data has the potential to improve outcomes and patient care. DATA-CAN has brought together an integrated network of patient representatives, healthcare professionals, academic and industry researchers as well as commercial organisations, such as Flatiron Health UK, to work together and change the landscape of cancer care across the UK.