Generating real-world data from health records: design of a patient-centric study in multiple sclerosis using a commercial health records platform.

Objective: The FlywheelMS study will explore the use of a real-world health record data set generated by PicnicHealth, a patient-centric health records platform, to improve understanding of disease course and patterns of care for patients with multiple sclerosis (MS).

Materials And Methods: The FlywheelMS study aims to enroll 5000 adults with MS in the United States to create a large, deidentified, longitudinal data set for clinical research. PicnicHealth obtains health records, including paper charts, electronic health records, and radiology imaging files from any healthcare site.