An intelligent fight against cancer

Reaktor partnered with Varian, the leader in radiation oncology, to help them improve the quality of global cancer care.

By revolutionizing treatment planning with sophisticated cloud-based software, we took a step closer to fulfilling Varian’s vision of a world without fear of cancer.

Collaboration highlights

A cloud-based platform to coordinate top-quality cancer care
Service ready for use in a clinical setting in under nine months
Meeting rigorous security and privacy requirements and regulatory standards of multiple markets
A team of developers and medical professionals, working together in an agile setting

Top-quality cancer care brought to the cloud

Superior treatment, regardless of location

In treating cancer patients, radiation oncologists have two primary goals: distributing enough radiation to the tumor to destroy it and minimizing the dosage to healthy organs to curtail side effects.

Reviewing radiation treatment plans is vital in ensuring that patients receive the highest standard of care. To streamline the process, Varian wanted to establish a way to review the plans without heavy machinery and license-based software.

What started as developers’ ambition to use their skills to save lives has now resulted in unique cloud-based solutions for radiation treatment. Going from an idea to a clinical solution in under nine months, we’ve helped Varian provide state-of-the-art cancer care, driving its goal of simpler, smarter cancer care.

“The purpose is not just to increase cancer survival. We also want to ensure that survivors’ post-treatment quality of life is the best it can be.”

Päivi Tuhkanen, Manager of Treatment Planning Services, Varian Medical Systems

Radiation treatment, streamlined

Planning the treatment

When a patient is diagnosed with cancer and starts radiotherapy, their physician crafts an elaborate plan for the treatment, carefully calculating radiation dose distribution.

Reviewing the plan

To ensure that the plan is efficient, safe, and feasible, it has to be reviewed by other doctors and specialists. The plan review has typically been done with heavy hardware and license-based software located in the hospital.

Smoothing out the process

With the cloud-based platforms, dose calculation and plan review can be done remotely, allowing top of the line specialists from all corners of the world to chime in.

Saving time, saving lives

This more efficient way of planning can significantly ease the treatment of complex cancer cases. In addition to increasing survival, it helps minimize side effects and improve survivors’ quality of life after the process.

Cloud services

Exponentially improving access to care

To enable remote cancer care and reduce dependence on on-premise applications, Varian aspires to move most of its long-established software to the cloud. Together with Varian’s development team, we built Azure-based platforms for planning radiation treatment.

By virtue of the elegant, reliable, and human-centered design, the software is effortless to deploy and use regardless of location.

Advanced treatment planning

Improving efficiency and expanding access

To help physicians with fast and precise planning for advanced cancer care, we built a tool to review radiation treatment plans and provide secondary opinions. It enables better communication between hospitals and their satellite clinics, providing access to top-tier specialists all over the world.

One of the first medical partners to deploy the software shall be The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, ranked No. 1 in cancer care in the United States.

“We believe the development of this unified platform will enable expansion of our radiation oncology quality standards to provide the best available care to more patients.”

Albert Koong, Professor and division head of Radiation Oncology, MD Anderson (press release, Oct 17, 2019)

Applicability and agility

Adjusting to clinical software development

Crafting a cloud service for clinical use meant paying intense attention to detail. From protecting patients’ most private health information to abiding by international medical regulations, we made sure to keep every aspect of applicability in check.

Our team integrated agile working methods with Varian’s century-old tradition of developing pioneering radiotherapy tools. The cultural change we initiated continues to yield fruitful results and power new victories over cancer.

“Reaktor’s swiftness and agility have helped us tremendously in taking things forward. The team is not only technically competent but also has a great attitude, creating a positive culture.”

Kari Toimela, Managing Director, Varian Medical Systems Finland