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Workshop/Symposium

Session: Symposia & Workshops: Session 3

Sharing is Caring? A Symposium on Code Sharing in Pharmacoepidemiology

Saturday, August 26, 2023
4:15 PM – 5:45 PM ADT
Location: MR201
Publication Number: 200
Background: Transparency in pharmacoepidemiology studies is critically important, especially given the increased use of real-world evidence (RWE) for regulatory decision making. Many open science resources and codes of conduct (e.g. ENCePP) encourage the sharing of all research materials, including data and code, to enable analyses to be independently verified and reproduced. Code sharing, in which the programming code used to process and analyse research data is made public, could provide an opportunity to increase the transparency and reproducibility of RWE, aid in replication attempts, and clarify the interpretation of the study protocol. This element is of particular importance since data sharing, which would be necessary for full transparency, is rarely possible.

Objectives: To provide an overview of the extent of, and trends in, code sharing in pharmacoepidemiology, identify potential barriers for code sharing and gather feedback on an initial set of recommendations and training suggestions for sharing programming code in the pharmacoepidemiology community. As such, our target audience includes all interested ISPE members working in a variety of settings (academic, industry, regulatory) and at different career stages.

Description: The workshop will have three elements. Firstly, we will provide an introduction to the principles of open code and present results from an ISPE funded literature review investigating the extent of and trends of code sharing in pharmacoepidemiology research (30 min). Secondly, there will be a series of “lightning” talks highlighting examples of code sharing from recent pharmacoepidemiology studies, focusing on how the code was shared and reflecting on key challenges. This will leverage experiences from our workshop team, working within the OpenSAFELY, OHDSI, EHDEN, DARWIN-EU, ConcePTION and VAC4EU research environments (20 min). Third, we will have an interactive panel discussion on this topic featuring perspectives from academia, industry and regulators (40 min). Potential barriers to code sharing will be considered, including concerns around time requirements, utility, copyright and licensing. We will also consider best practices in code sharing and how these can integrate with existing initiatives (e.g. HARPER) to improve transparency in RWE. The panel discussion will be structured around a series of interactive questions and prompts, with the audience encouraged to participate through use of real-time polling and a Q&A.