Implementation of a Prototype Teratology Data Management System Using SAS

Abstract

For my SIP, I did some computer work at The Upjohn Company's (main facility in Kalamazoo, MI, USA) research subsidiary in Japan. I wrote code to take experimental data and output simple statistics into tables. The program I worked on was to be used as a prototype for a software company called Xybion (based in New Jersey). Some groups in Upjohn use a Xybion data management system, but Xybion did not have a teratology module in their system, so I was to write a sample teratology system to show to Xybion. Briefly, teratology is the study of birth defects. A teratology study is generally the first safety type study done with a new drug. I wrote this teratology data management system not in FORTRAN, or C, but using the Statistical Analysis System, or SAS. SAS is a pseudo-programming language designed to do statistical analysis on large data sets. SAS is primarily made up of numerous standard procedures or "procs." Because it has so many predefined statistical procedures, SAS users can plug their data sets in and have all of the calculations come out the other end, without a lot of statistical programming. The system I worked on takes data generated in teratology studies calculates some simple statistical values, such as the mean and the standard deviation, and writes these values out to tables. Separate tables or values were generated depending on sex and dose group. Though it might be considered data analysis to some extent, I did no analytic calculations while programming the system.