On June 5, 2025, Dr. Venus Oliva Cloma-Rosales, Managing Director of 101 Health Research, presented at the UP Institute of Statistics (UP ISC) Webinar Series. Her talk, titled “Health Data, Social Impact: Data Science and AI for Universal Health Care in the Philippines,” drew attention to the transformative potential of health data in advancing equity, efficiency, and decision-making across the Philippine health system.
Big Data, Big Reforms
Dr. Cloma-Rosales began with a detailed exploration of PhilHealth claims data—over 73 million observations—used to assess the All Case Rates (ACR) policy as a provider payment mechanism. Through robust quantitative and qualitative methods, the team evaluated population coverage, service utilization, and financial protection across various regions and provider types.
Findings informed practical recommendations for improving PhilHealth’s reimbursement systems and suggested pathways for shifting toward more adaptive payment models. These include the potential implementation of diagnosis-related groupings (DRGs), enhanced auditing systems, and IT-supported monitoring protocols.
HERDIN Reimagined: AI for Access
A significant portion of the presentation focused on the AI-powered redesign of HERDIN, the national health research database. Historically hampered by manual encoding and backlogs, HERDIN is now supported by an automated encoding pipeline developed by the Innovidence AI Lab at 101 Health Research.
This pipeline leverages large language models (LLMs), optical character recognition (OCR), and metadata extraction tools to digitize scanned research documents across diverse formats—including theses, patents, and journal articles. The result is a dramatically streamlined and scalable system now deployed in the HERDIN PLUS desktop application.
Network Science and Nutrition
Rounding out the talk was a discussion of network science applied to endometriosis, where the team analyzed the dietary patterns of Filipino women using Gaussian Graphical Models. They found that soft drink and dairy consumption, when paired, were more prevalent in those with endometriosis. The insights open new avenues for personalized nutrition guidance in clinical settings.
Impact and Vision
Dr. Cloma-Rosales emphasized that data is not just about numbers. When combined with human-centered design and AI, it becomes a tool for social impact—driving policy reform, empowering local institutions, and ultimately improving health outcomes for all Filipinos.
The webinar underscored the commitment of 101 Health Research to turning complexity into clarity, making health data more useful, accessible, and actionable.
To request a copy of the slides or explore partnership opportunities, email us at hello@101healthresearch.com.