In order to address the limitations of previous work including small cohort sizes, single imaging modalities and lack of longitudinal data, we developed AlzEye, an unprecedented large pseuodnymised dataset linking retinal photographs and OCT scans with NHS Digital Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) data on cardiovascular disease and neurodegenerative disease with additional covariate labels including diabetes mellitus, hypertensive diseases, disorders of lipoprotein metabolism and all diseases of pulmonary circulation. The AlzEye data linkage is funded by a grant from Fight for Sight UK and Alzheimer’s Research UK, awarded in October 2017 and led by Dr Pearse Keane & Dr Siegfried Wagner. Our data linkage strategy and information governance measures have been complimented by the UK Research Ethics Committee and NHS Digital with the independent panel, IGARD, highlighting that our application “could be used as an exemplar to help other researchers with their applications to the Data Access Request Service” (IGARD minutes 24.01.2019).

Privacy & Terms

The AlzEye Moorfields privacy notice can be found here.