Sample size and its evolution in research

Objective: Sample size is one of the crucial and basic steps involved in planning any study. This article aims to study the evolution of sample size across the years from hundreds to thousands to millions and to a trillion in the near future (H-K-M-B-T). It also aims to understand the importance of sampling in the era of big data. Study Design - Primary Outcome measure, Methods, Results, and Interpretation: A sample size which is too small will not be a true representation of the population whereas a large sample size will involve putting more individuals at risk. An optimum sample size needs to be employed to identify statistically significant differences if they exist and obtain scientifically valid results. The design of the study, the primary outcome, sampling method used, dropout rate, effect size, power, level of significance, and standard deviation are some of the multiple factors which affect the sample size. All these factors need to be taken into account while calculating the sample size. Many sources are available for calculating sample size. Discretion needs to be used while choosing the right source. The large volumes of data and the corresponding number of data points being analyzed is redefining many industries including healthcare. The larger the sample size, the more insightful information, identification of rare side effects, lesser margin of error, higher confidence level, and models with more accuracy. Advances in the digital era have ensured that we do not face most of the obstacles faced traditionally with regards to statistical sampling, yet it has its own set of challenges. Hence, considerable efforts and time should be invested in selecting sampling techniques which are appropriate and reducing sampling bias and errors. This will ensure the reliability and reproducibility in the results obtained. Along with a large sample size, the focus should be on getting to know the data better, the sample frame and the context in which it was collected. We need to focus on creation of good quality data and structured systems to capture the sample. Good data quality management makes sure that the data are structured appropriately.

Big Data between Quality and Security: Dynamic Access Control for Collaborative Platforms

Big Data often refers to a set of technologies dedicated to deal with large volumes of data. Data Quality and Data Security are two essential aspects for any Big Data project. While Data Quality Management Systems are about putting in place a set of processes to assess and improve certain characteristics of data such as Accuracy, Consistency, Completeness, Timeliness, etc., Security Systems are designed to protect the Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability of data. In a Big Data environment, data quality processes can be blocked by data security mechanisms. Indeed, data is often collected from external sources that could impose their own security policies. In many research works, it has been recognized that merging and integrating access control policies are real challenges for Big Data projects. To address this issue, we suggest in this paper a framework to secure data collection in collaborative platforms. Our framework extends and combines two existing frameworks namely: PolyOrBAC and SLA- Framework. PolyOrBAC is a framework intended for the protection of collaborative environments. SLA-Framework, for its part, is an implementation of the WS-Agreement Specification, the standard for managing bilaterally negotiable SLAs (Service Level Agreements) in distributed systems; its integration into PolyOrBAC will automate the implementation and application of security rules. The resulting framework will then be incorporated into a data quality assessment system to create a secure and dynamic collaborative activity in the Big Data context.

Quality Management of Patient Generated Health Data from Wearables: Development of a Guideline for Remote Patient Monitoring (Preprint)

BACKGROUND Patient-Generated Health Data (PGHD) collected from innovative wearables are enabling healthcare to shift to outside clinical settings through Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM) initiatives. However, PGHD are collected continuously under the patient’s responsibilities in rapidly changing circumstances during the patient’s daily life. This poses risks to the quality of PGHD and, in turn, reduces their trustworthiness and fitness for use in clinical practice. OBJECTIVE Using a socio-technical health informatics lens, this research aimed to investigate how Data Quality Management (DQM) principles can be applied to ensure that PGHD from wearables can reliably inform clinical decision making in RPM. METHODS First, clinicians, health information specialists and MedTech industry representatives with experience in RPM were interviewed to identify DQM challenges. Second, those groups were joined by patients in a workshop to co-design potential solutions to meet the expectations of all stakeholders. Third, the findings along with literature and policy review results, were interpreted to construct a guideline. Finally, we validated the guideline through a Delphi survey of international health informatics and health information management experts. RESULTS The resulting guideline comprised 19 recommendations across seven aspects of DQM. It explicitly addressed the needs of patients and clinicians but implied that there must be collaboration among all stakeholders, to meet these needs. CONCLUSIONS The increasing proliferation of PGHD from wearables in RPM requires a systematic approach to DQM so that these data can be reliably used in clinical care. The developed guideline is a significant next step toward safe RPM.

The Architecture of Mass Customization-Social Internet of Things System: Current Research Profile

In the era of big data, mass customization (MC) systems are faced with the complexities associated with information explosion and management control. Thus, it has become necessary to integrate the mass customization system and Social Internet of Things, in order to effectively connecting customers with enterprises. We should not only allow customers to participate in MC production throughout the whole process, but also allow enterprises to control all links throughout the whole information system. To gain a better understanding, this paper first describes the architecture of the proposed system from organizational and technological perspectives. Then, based on the nature of the Social Internet of Things, the main technological application of the mass customization–Social Internet of Things (MC–SIOT) system is introduced in detail. On this basis, the key problems faced by the mass customization–Social Internet of Things system are listed. Our findings are as follows: (1) MC–SIOT can realize convenient information queries and clearly understand the user’s intentions; (2) the system can predict the changing relationships among different technical fields and help enterprise R&D personnel to find technical knowledge; and (3) it can interconnect deep learning technology and digital twin technology to better maintain the operational state of the system. However, there exist some challenges relating to data management, knowledge discovery, and human–computer interaction, such as data quality management, few data samples, a lack of dynamic learning, labor consumption, and task scheduling. Therefore, we put forward possible improvements to be assessed, as well as privacy issues and emotional interactions to be further discussed, in future research. Finally, we illustrate the behavior and evolutionary mechanism of this system, both qualitatively and quantitatively. This provides some idea of how to address the current issues pertaining to mass customization systems.

Data Ecosystems for Scientific Experiments: Managing Combustion Experiments and Simulation Analyses in Chemical Engineering

The development of scientific predictive models has been of great interest over the decades. A scientific model is capable of forecasting domain outcomes without the necessity of performing expensive experiments. In particular, in combustion kinetics, the model can help improving the combustion facilities and the fuel efficiency reducing the pollutants. At the same time, the amount of available scientific data has increased and helped speeding up the continuous cycle of model improvement and validation. This has also opened new opportunities for leveraging a large amount of data to support knowledge extraction. However, experiments are affected by several data quality problems since they are a collection of information over several decades of research, each characterized by different representation formats and reasons of uncertainty. In this context, it is necessary to develop an automatic data ecosystem capable of integrating heterogeneous information sources while maintaining a quality repository. We present an innovative approach to data quality management from the chemical engineering domain, based on an available prototype of a scientific framework, SciExpeM, which has been significantly extended. We identified a new methodology from the model development research process that systematically extracts knowledge from the experimental data and the predictive model. In the paper, we show how our general framework could support the model development process, and save precious research time also in other experimental domains with similar characteristics, i.e., managing numerical data from experiments.

Data Quality Management in the Internet of Things

Nowadays, IoT is being used in more and more application areas and the importance of IoT data quality is widely recognized by practitioners and researchers. The requirements for data and its quality vary from application to application or organization in different contexts. Many methodologies and frameworks include techniques for defining, assessing, and improving data quality. However, due to the diversity of requirements, it can be a challenge to choose the appropriate technique for the IoT system. This paper surveys data quality frameworks and methodologies for IoT data, and related international standards, comparing them in terms of data types, data quality definitions, dimensions and metrics, and the choice of assessment dimensions. The survey is intended to help narrow down the possible choices of IoT data quality management technique.