Interactive Dashboard and Visualization Tool Designed for Oncologists

A new tool has been developed to help users of an information system for radiation oncology to analyze data and use metrics to help make more informed decisions.

Varian Medical Systems (Palo Alto CA, USA), a developer of cancer treatment technology and informatics software for managing comprehensive cancer clinics, will introduce InSightive Analytics, a new interactive dashboard and data visualization tool for oncology professionals, at the annual meeting of the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO), held in San Francisco (CA, USA), from September 14-17, 2014.

InSightive Analytics will enable users of Varian’s ARIA oncology information system to rapidly access, organize, and analyze data captured during clinical and administrative operations in radiation oncology, to help drive better clinical decision-making and outcomes. Pre-built templates within the tool allow quick organization and display of key healthcare metrics across the, clinic, hospital, or network. Data can be gathered on payer mix, referral sources, patient zip codes, operational performance, patient volume, case mix per treatment unit, physician volumes, and more. Data can be benchmarked against historical data for trend analysis, and reports can be exported as Excel or Adobe PDF files, and e-mail messages.

“ARIA is a robust practice management system and electronic medical record with a tremendous amount of information that can be mined and analyzed to enhance the quality of care and the efficiency of clinical operations at any given site,” said Sukhveer Singh, vice president of Varian’s oncology continuum solutions. “Many customers use ARIA to become paperless clinics, so all the information that once went into paper charts is now entered into the ARIA system. ARIA also offers many interfaces for importing data from other hospital information systems, resulting in a very rich resource that, up to now, was difficult to mine for actionable knowledge. InSightive Analytics provides access to this data, making it visible and useful.”

InSightive Analytics will enable users to find important patterns and trends quickly so they can make more informed data-driven decisions. Users can preprogram dashboards to generate reports on a routine schedule. Tables and graphs can be exported for presentation. According to Mr. Singh, it will be particularly helpful for cancer center administrators who need to manage resources.

“Often departmental administrators are trying to make important decisions based on [US] MediCare billing data that might be weeks or months old, and often only includes some 40%–60% of the patient population,” said Mr. Singh. “With InSightive Analytics drawing directly from the ARIA database as patients receive their treatments, it will be possible to aggregate up-to-date information and use it to identify opportunities and strategies for enhancing clinical, operational and financial outcomes.”

“We know that today’s cancer care professionals, like all medical practitioners, are under pressure to control healthcare costs while improving coordination and quality outcomes. Having access to the right information at the right time has never been more essential,” stated Kolleen Kennedy, president of Varian’s oncology systems business. “As a tool that leverages new developments in informatics and big data mining, InSightive Analytics is designed to help our customers deliver high-quality, evidence-based care.”

InSightive Analytics is still a works-in-progress and not yet available for sale.

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Varian Medical Systems