Ruben Mesa, MD, FACP, from the Mayo Cancer Clinic Center, Rochester, MN, USA, discusses the difficulties in analysing and interpreting large data sets relating to the treatment of patients with cancer. He explains that there is a need for collaboration between multidisciplinary groups such as biostatisticians and people in the analytics department in order to correctly interpret large data sets. This interview was filmed at the European Hematology Association (EHA) 2017 Annual Congress in Madrid, Spain.