31 / 92
350
YEARS
OF
SCIENCE
31
A medical data warehouse with relevant data extraction modules
© Nicolas Garcelon, Institut Imagine, Paris
© Granger Historical Picture Archve - Alamy
Nicolas de Condorcet (1743-1794)
Clinical databases / EHR
Extract
Transform
Load
E
T
L
User interface
Sources
Data
Warehouse
Knowledge databases and
ontology
Database
Data mining algorithm
Security module
Search engine
Prognosis, treatment
The cost of innovative treatments – as illustrated in the recent period of time by the new anticancer
drugs – is a factor weighing heavy on the risk that inequality of access to care may worsen. Such issues
call for an in-depth ethical reflection, in
order to make any progress in medicine the
part of a human vision, draw the lines and
prevent abuses. In this context, Nicolas
de Condorcet’s text – in
Outlines of an
historical view of the progress of the human
mind
, 1794 – proves widely prophetic: "
It is
manifest that the improvement of the practice
of medicine (…) must in the end put a period
to transmissible or contagious disorders, as
well to those general maladies resulting from
climate, aliments, and the nature of certain
occupations. Nor would it be difficult to prove
that this hope might be extended to almost
every other malady, of which it is probable
we shall hereafter discover the most remote
causes."
EHR = electronic health record