Blog Post by Ruud Selles
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On 8 January, the OHDSI Europe Community Call brought together around 100 participants to explore how European projects are using the OMOP Common Data Model (OMOP-CDM). A key highlight was a joint presentation on the PREPARE and UMBRELLA projects, delivered by Ruud Selles and Lisa Hoogendam from Erasmus MC.
What is OHDSI and OMOP-CDM?
The Observational Health Data Sciences and Informatics (OHDSI) initiative is a global, open-science collaboration that aims to unlock the value of health data through large-scale analytics. Its goal is to generate reliable evidence that supports better health decisions and improved care.
At the heart of this work is the OMOP Common Data Model (OMOP-CDM), a standardised data structure that harmonises diverse healthcare data sources. This enables reproducible research and supports the use of powerful open-source analytical tools across institutions and countries.
OHDSI Europe, coordinated by Erasmus MC, brings together a strong regional community to promote OMOP-CDM adoption and to support tool development across European projects.
The UMBRELLA Project
Funded by the Innovative Health Initiative (IHI), UMBRELLA aims to transform stroke management across Europe. The project addresses gaps across the entire stroke care pathway, from pre-hospital triage to post-hospital rehabilitation, by developing a federated data platform with harmonised real-world stroke data using OMOP-CDM.
UMBRELLA integrates AI-based technologies to support personalised diagnosis, risk prediction, and treatment decisions, while maintaining data privacy through federated learning. Rehabilitation is part of this holistic approach, ensuring continuity of care and active patient engagement throughout recovery.
And, of course, our own: PREPARE-REHAB Project
PREPARE-REHAB (Personalised Rehabilitation via Novel AI Patient Stratification Strategies) is a Horizon Europe project designed to transform rehabilitation care. With 16 partners across Europe, PREPARE focuses on personalising rehabilitation through AI-driven prediction models based on real-world data.
Nine rehabilitation datasets will be mapped to OMOP-CDM, allowing them to be analysed using OHDSI tools and supporting data-driven clinical decision-making.
Synergy Between PREPARE, UMBRELLA, and OHDSI
PREPARE and UMBRELLA share a strong commitment to data standardisation, interoperability, and open science. Rehabilitation is a core component of both projects, and, amongst others, mapping complex interventions and patient-reported outcomes into OMOP-CDM represents both a challenge and an opportunity.
By using the OHDSI ecosystem, both projects aim to harmonise diverse datasets and integrate predictive models into clinical workflows. Together, these efforts strengthen the European health data landscape, supporting better evidence generation, smarter digital tools, and improved patient outcomes.
Learn more here:
🔗 umbrella-ihi.eu – ohdsi.org – https://www.ohdsi-europe.org/ – https://prepare-rehab.eu/
It was a pleasure to connect with such an engaged research community and to discover so many meaningful initiatives in health research.
Proud to be part of these conversations shaping the future of health research at PREPARE-REHAB!
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Posted by: Nayara Güércio (Trilateral Research)