Crowdsourcing Disease Biomarker Discovery Research; The IP4IC Study

Biomarker discovery is limited by readily assessable, cost efficient, human samples available in large numbers that represent the entire heterogeneity of the disease. We developed a novel active participation crowdsourcing method to develop a Bladder Permeability Defect Risk Score (BP-RS) based on non-invasive urinary cytokines to discriminate Interstitial cystitis/bladder pain syndrome (IC/BPS) with Hunner's lesion (UIC) patients from controls and IC patients without Hunner's lesions.

A national crowdsourcing study was done in cooperation with the Interstitial Cystitis Association. Patients answered demographic, symptom severity, and urinary frequency questionnaires on a HIPAA compliant website. Urine samples were collected at home, stabilized with a preservative and sent to Beaumont for analysis. Expression of three urinary cytokines was used in a machine learning algorithm to develop the BP-RS.

IP4IC study collected 448 urine samples consisting of 153 IC patients (147 female, 6 male), of which 54 were UIC patients (50 females, 4 male), 159 female controls and 136 male controls. Controls were age-matched.. A defined BP-RS was calculated to predict UIC, or a bladder permeability defect etiology, with 89% validity.

This novel participation crowdsourcing study collected a large number of urine samples from 46 states collected at home, shipped, and stored at room temperature. Using a machine learning algorithm, we developed the BP-RS to quantify UIC risk, indicative of a bladder permeability defect etiology. The BP-RS is the first validated urine biomarker assay for IC/BPS and one of the first biomarker assays to be developed using crowdsourcing.

The Journal of urology. 2017 Dec 07 [Epub ahead of print]

Michael B Chancellor, Sarah N Bartolone, Andrew Veerecke, Laura E Lamb

Department of Urology, Beaumont Health System, Royal Oak, MI, United States of America; Oakland University William Beaumont School of Medicine, Rochester Hills, MI, United States of America. Electronic address: ., Department of Urology, Beaumont Health System, Royal Oak, MI, United States of America., Department of Urology, Beaumont Health System, Royal Oak, MI, United States of America; Oakland University William Beaumont School of Medicine, Rochester Hills, MI, United States of America.