I use R in the NHS to…
understand the epidemiology of cancer and health inequalities in care access and outcomes
I use R for…
… and have been using R for…
If your work or the work of your team suddenly ceased tomorrow, what would be the consequences for the NHS?
No national cancer statistics, no further insights into cancer and its treatment
What first drew you to R?
Strong support and great visualisations
What other tools do you use?
SQL, Excel
What resources would you recommend to other R users?
Tell me something surprising about yourself!
I’m a vet (in a previous life)
I use R in the NHS to…
automate categorisation of free-text comments using Supervised ML algorithms
I use R for…
… and have been using R for…
If your work or the work of your team suddenly ceased tomorrow, what would be the consequences for the NHS?
Key Strategic & Operational decisions made on gut feelings and hunches, anecdotal info. rather than via. evidence based approach.
What first drew you to R?
First used R during my MSc Statistics course.
What other tools do you use?
SQL, Power BI, Alteryx, Dataiku
What resources would you recommend to other R users?
NHS-R slack group, minefield of information and home to clever people 😄
Tell me something surprising about yourself!
I desperately want to re-read Stephen Donaldson’s The Chronicles of Thomas Convenant.
I use R in the NHS to…
automate and innovate
I use R for…
… and have been using R for…
If your work or the work of your team suddenly ceased tomorrow, what would be the consequences for the NHS?
What first drew you to R?
The possibilities around automation. I came to the 2019 conference and was really inspired.
What other tools do you use?
SQL, Excel, Power BI
What resources would you recommend to other R users?
Stack overflow and the slack group
Tell me something surprising about yourself!
I use R in the NHS to…
analise QC data from X-ray machines, Linacs, patient doses, mammography vans, etc. To make sure the patients do not receive more radiation dose than needed
I use R for…
… and have been using R for…
If your work or the work of your team suddenly ceased tomorrow, what would be the consequences for the NHS?
The patients that need radiotherapy as part of their cancer treatment pathway would be left without the treatment they need.
What first drew you to R?
The need to analise large sets of data and produce plots that accurately represent the results I found.
What other tools do you use?
Excel
What resources would you recommend to other R users?
https://r4ds.had.co.nz/
Tell me something surprising about yourself!
I am from Ecuador and I learned English mostly from listening to songs and watching series.
I use R in the NHS to…
tidy and analyse data, create websites and teaching materials
I use R for…
… and have been using R for…
If your work or the work of your team suddenly ceased tomorrow, what would be the consequences for the NHS?
A loss of my team/my work for the NHS would mean a loss of openness and transparency in sharing how to do data science. We are mainly working to improve NHS analytics as a whole rather than accomplish many projects in isolation.
What first drew you to R?
Curiosity! There were only a couple of people in my Trust of 11k people using it and it sounded very interesting. I’ve always enjoyed coding and wanted to learn more and, with the promise of learning some statistics and the free workshop available from the newly formed NHS-R Community I got started in learning R.
What other tools do you use?
SQL
What resources would you recommend to other R users?
NHS-R Slack group. It’s where you can find the community who are keen to help and share knowledge in a friendly and supportive environment.
Tell me something surprising about yourself!
For someone who loves coding and even once worked on an IT helpdesk, I’m terrible with technology.
I use R in the NHS to…
clean data, analyse data, and create reports
I use R for…
… and have been using R for…
If your work or the work of your team suddenly ceased tomorrow, what would be the consequences for the NHS?
Managers and decision makers would have no information
What first drew you to R?
Open source, free, lots of useful packages for statistics with peer reviewed papers supporting them
What other tools do you use?
SQL, Excel, Power BI
What resources would you recommend to other R users?
Other than the slacks for the NHS R community and RLadies, the R4DS Online Learning Community slack is also very friendly and helpful
Tell me something surprising about yourself!
I came 3rd in the Pandemic (the board game) National Championships one year
