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. 2024 Jan 31;11(1):152.
doi: 10.1038/s41597-024-02956-3.

A General Primer for Data Harmonization

Cindy Cheng  1 , Luca Messerschmidt  2 , Isaac Bravo  2 , Marco Waldbauer  2 , Rohan Bhavikatti, Caress Schenk  3 , Vanja Grujic  4 , Tim Model  5 , Robert Kubinec  6 , Joan Barceló  6
Affiliations

A General Primer for Data Harmonization

Cindy Cheng et al. Sci Data. .

Abstract

Data harmonization is an important method for combining or transforming data. To date however, articles about data harmonization are field-specific and highly technical, making it difficult for researchers to derive general principles for how to engage in and contextualize data harmonization efforts. This commentary provides a primer on the tradeoffs inherent in data harmonization for researchers who are considering undertaking such efforts or seek to evaluate the quality of existing ones. We derive this guidance from the extant literature and our own experience in harmonizing data for the emergent and important new field of COVID-19 public health and safety measures (PHSM).

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

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Fig. 1
General Steps for Data Harmonization.
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