IBM and Russian partners want to create high tech personalized medicine in Russia

IBM, Russia’s Skolkovo Foundation and the Moscow-based First Oncology Research and Advisory Center are forming a partnership to focus on the development of a platform for high tech personalized medicine in Russia, the Skolkovo Foundation website  announced . 

According to an MoU inked just recently, the partnership will pursue a number of shared strategic, technological and marketing goals in advancing the platform that will offer physicians innovation technologies in order to add health and productivity to the lives of oncology patients and people with age-related degenerative problems. 

It is expected that the platform will enable doctors to quickly choose the best possible therapy for a specific case and apply new techniques to fighting a disease, the partners said. 

IBM Watson Health, a time-tested U.S. system, and OncoFinder, a solution developed at the First Oncology Research and Advisory Center in Russia, will lend physicians a hand in making clinical decisions. 

OncoFinder is a high accuracy medical tool for analysis of intra-cell signal paths and selection of the best available drugs for various cancers, explained Dr. Anton Buzdin, the CEO of the Russian oncology center. 

“A combination of OncoFinder with IBM Watson, the latter being perhaps the world’s most powerful system to support medical decision-making, will help doctors save the lives of patients, improve medical services, and make clinical examinations faster,” Dr. Buzdin said. 

The First Oncology Research and Advisory Center actively collaborates with a number of international partners, such as the U.S.’ Insilico Medicine and Hong Kong’s Pathway Pharmaceuticals (both specializing in pharmaceutical research, the development of new therapeutic compositions, and the modification of existing ones).

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