Research Facilities

Research facilities

The Future of Healthcare Starts Here

The Department of Pharmaceutical Outcomes and Policy has excellent research facilities that support studies involving big data and statistical modeling.

HSC Aerials 2016

Our quantitative research facilities include computer labs for students, a department-owned secure research server that houses several population-based data sets and a variety of software packages. Our qualitative research infrastructure includes conference facilities with state-of-the art equipment for focus groups or patient interviews.

POP’s Core Facilities Include:

  • A large conference-style room dedicated to ongoing research studies with a wall-mounted video camera
  • A TV monitor for wireless projection
  • Omnidirectional microphones
  • A research office that allows hardwired access to the department’s research server
  • A large graduate student office (with about 20 work spaces)
  • The department also provides an array of hardware, software, and personnel; including a Statistical Research Coordinator who serves as both a database query specialist and statistical consultant

POP’s High Speed Research Server:

  • 45Tb high speed disk storage system
  • Network hardware, backup and disaster recovery infrastructure
  • Currently houses (along with smaller data sets to support ongoing studies) billing records for more than 100 million lives from Medicaid Extract Files (MAX) and MarketScan® Data, as well as, UF Health Electronic Health Records from 100,000 admissions

Located in a secure and environmentally controlled server farm at the UF Health Science Center. The server is accessed through secure desktop PC terminals in POP’s P.E. Foote Health Outcomes Laboratory, through authorized Foote Lab staff office desktop PC’s, and through a highly secure Virtual Desktop Interface (VDI) system that can be installed on any notebook or desktop PC.

The VDI system enables authorized users to access the research server from any remote location, allowing them to work flexibly within the server’s computing environment while at the same time completely preventing any uploading of malware/viruses or downloading of sensitive data between the remote PC and the server.