For 50 years, SAS has worked alongside organizations trying to solve some of the most complex challenges in health care.
Over that time, the tools have evolved dramatically. The industry has moved from paper records and mainframes to cloud platforms, AI models and genomic datasets spanning millions of data points. But the goal has remained remarkably consistent: help people see patterns in data that improve patient outcomes.
Sometimes that means detecting when a hospital patient’s condition is quietly deteriorating. Sometimes it means helping researchers identify biomarkers that could prevent life-threatening complications in pregnancy. Other times, it means accelerating the discovery of entirely new therapies.
Health care innovation rarely comes from a single breakthrough. More often, it comes from many insights – small signals in data that help clinicians, researchers and organizations make better decisions.
To mark our 50th anniversary, we looked back at a handful of customer stories that illustrate how analytics and AI are helping uncover those signals across the health care ecosystem.
Each story tackles a different challenge, but together they show how data continues to reshape the future of medicine.
Turning donor insights into more pediatric cancer research: The Kids’ Cancer Project
For childhood cancer research organizations, funding can directly influence the pace of breakthroughs.
The Kids’ Cancer Project, an Australian charity dedicated to improving outcomes for children with cancer, is using analytics to better understand donor engagement and strengthen its fundraising efforts. By analyzing supporter behavior and outreach strategies, the organization can connect with donors more effectively and expand the resources available for pediatric cancer research.
While the analytics aren’t happening inside the laboratory, they play a crucial role in enabling the research itself – helping generate the funding needed to pursue new treatments and improve survival rates for young patients.
SAS® Customer Intelligence 360 provides real-time visibility, allowing us to see where supporters arrive, how they navigate across our channels, when and where they choose to donate, as well as where they drop off. We now have a unified view of the donor journey, allowing for more timely and personalized engagement. Henry Yuen, Head of Technology and Data, The Kids' Cancer Project
Finding patterns that improve patient care: Erasmus University Medical Center
Hospitals generate enormous amounts of clinical and operational data every day. The challenge is turning that information into insights that actually improve care.
At Erasmus University Medical Center in the Netherlands, analytics is helping clinicians and researchers uncover patterns that improve patient outcomes and enhance hospital operations. By applying advanced analytics to clinical data, the organization can identify trends, optimize resources and respond more quickly to emerging health issues.
In environments where time and accuracy matter enormously, greater visibility into data can directly translate into better care decisions.
To fully implement a model at the bedside, you need trust. And that is what we’re now currently building. Dr. Michel van Genderen, Internist-Intensivist, Erasmus Medical Center
Combating one of the world’s most urgent medical threats: Frankfurt University Hospital
Antibiotic resistance has become one of the most pressing global health challenges of our time.
Frankfurt University Hospital is using analytics to better understand how antibiotics are prescribed and used throughout the hospital system. By analyzing treatment patterns and outcomes, clinicians can identify opportunities to optimize antibiotic use, reduce unnecessary prescriptions and ensure patients receive the most effective therapies.
These insights help protect the long-term effectiveness of antibiotics while improving patient care today.
I’m very happy that we can now implement analytics tools that help us act earlier and avoid complications. This approach lets us move faster and find new ways to help patients. Dr. Michael von Wagner, Chief Medical Information Officer, Frankfurt University Hospital
Accelerating the path from discovery to treatment: Shionogi
Developing new medicines has always required navigating massive amounts of scientific data.
Pharmaceutical company Shionogi is using analytics and AI to help researchers analyze complex datasets more efficiently during drug development. By identifying promising patterns earlier in research and clinical trials, scientists can focus their efforts on therapies with the greatest potential impact.
Faster insights in drug development can ultimately mean faster access to life-changing treatments for patients.
With AI-SAS, powered by SAS® Viya®, we accelerated drug development. AI-SAS significantly reduced the work required to analyze clinical trials and improved the efficiency of that work. Dr. Yoshitake Kitanishi, Associate Corporate Officer, Head of Data Science Department, Shionogi & Co. Ltd.
Addressing the opioid crisis through better insight: Brooks Rehabilitation
The opioid epidemic continues to affect communities across the world and understanding the factors behind addiction and recovery is critical to addressing it.
Brooks Rehabilitation is using analytics to study treatment outcomes, patient behavior and broader trends related to opioid use. These insights help clinicians better understand risk factors, refine treatment approaches and support patients on their path to recovery.
Data-driven insights like these give care providers stronger tools to address one of today’s most urgent public health challenges.
Detecting patient deterioration earlier: Spacelabs Healthcare (The Rothman Index)
One of the most difficult tasks in hospital care is recognizing subtle changes in a patient’s condition before they become critical.
Spacelabs Healthcare developed the Rothman Index, a monitoring tool that combines multiple clinical indicators into a single score to help clinicians identify early signs of patient deterioration. By providing a clearer picture of patient risk, the tool enables care teams to intervene earlier and potentially prevent serious complications.
In many cases, those earlier interventions can mean the difference between recovery and crisis.
SAS has been critical for studying Rothman Index’s impact on patient outcomes. SAS has allowed us to test hypotheses quickly, which helped accelerate our research. Michael Rothman, Co-creator of the Rothman Index and Advisory Data Scientist, Spacelabs Healthcare
Advancing research that could save mothers and infants: University College Dublin
Pre-eclampsia is a serious pregnancy complication that remains a leading cause of maternal and infant mortality worldwide.
Researchers at University College Dublin are using advanced analytics to investigate biomarkers that could help detect the condition earlier and guide more effective treatments. By analyzing complex biological data, researchers are uncovering insights that could improve diagnosis and outcomes for mothers and babies.
Progress in this area could help save tens of thousands of lives each year.
Clinicians must have absolute trust in the system and SAS and Microsoft were able to help us deliver on this right at the start. Patricia Maguire Professor University College Dublin
Understanding population health through DNA and data: Healthy Nevada Project
Health outcomes are influenced by far more than genetics alone. Environment, lifestyle and social factors all play a role.
The Healthy Nevada Project is combining large-scale DNA analysis with advanced analytics to better understand how these factors interact across entire populations. By studying the relationships between genetics, environment and health outcomes, researchers are gaining insights that could help predict, treat and prevent disease more effectively.
Projects like this point toward a future where medicine becomes increasingly proactive and personalized.
We have cases where people have told us, ‘Thank you so much, you saved my life,’ because they were able to have preventive surgery, or they found a treatable Stage I tumor because of the results of genetic testing. Those are the things we live for in this project. Jim Metcalf Director, Data Science, Healthy Nevada Project
The next chapter of health care innovation
If there’s one theme connecting these stories, it’s this: the most important discoveries often start with seeing something that was previously invisible.
A pattern hidden in hospital data.
A signal buried inside genomic research.
A subtle shift in patient health indicators.
Over the past 50 years, SAS has helped health care organizations uncover those signals and turn them into better decisions that improve care, accelerate research and save lives.
The stories here represent just a small snapshot of how organizations around the world are using data and AI to move medicine forward.
And as the next era of health care unfolds – from precision medicine to predictive care – the ability to turn data into knowledge will remain one of the most powerful tools we have.
