IBM Watson Health continued its run of strategic partnerships, announcing Tuesday a joint initiative with Quest Diagnostics that it says will democratize patient access to tumor sequencing.
The program draws on Watson’s cognitive computing power and Quest’s network of laboratories, which service 70 percent of U.S. cancer clinics. The service will also involve data from Memorial Sloan Kettering’s OncoKB, a precision oncology tool that can help inform precision treatment options for cancer patients.
According to the joint news release from IBM Watson Health and Quest, the partnership – dubbed Watson Genomics from Quest Diagnostics – expands patient and physician access to Watson’s analytical capabilities beyond the major cancer centers.
The partnership of course leverages IBM’s multi-billion dollar cognitive computing baby – the Watson supercomputer. While it was built with a human-like ability to learn, Watson ironically does so at superhuman speeds. As outlined in a recent CBS News “60 Minutes” episode, some of that ability is now being channeled towards cancer genomics.
“The real power of these cognitive computing systems is being able to sift through vast amounts of information very quickly,” said Steve Harvey, vice president of IBM Watson Health, in a phone interview.
Harvey said Watson can analyze tumor sequencing results “in a matter of minutes,” trawling through hundreds of thousands of scientific, clinical and pharmacopeia databases. Every month, the computer ingests approximately 10,000 scientific articles and 100 new clinical trials, guaranteeing the most up-to-date results.
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“Quest brings the scale,” Harvey said, noting that only a small fraction of the estimated two million patients with late-stage cancer in the U.S. currently receive tumor sequencing.
The process takes around two weeks, beginning with a biopsy of the patient’s tumor. The provider then sends the sample to a Quest laboratory where it is screened and sequenced. The resulting information is fed into Watson, which finds trends and correlations that can inform treatment options. Quest will also handle the payment logistics.
For the time being, the Watson Genomics from Quest Diagnostics partnership can only process solid tumors, though Harvey noted that they expect to add capacity for blood cancers in early 2017.
By contrast, Foundation Medicine, which has been offering tumor DNA sequencing since 2012 and is on the forefront of cancer genomics testing can accept both solid and non-solid tumor samples in its labs.
To ensure accurate results, Watson has been programmed to grade scientific literature based on the quality of available evidence — a lens that human scientists instinctively apply.
Harvey also stressed that Watson doesn’t operate in isolation. The information it generates is shared first with Quest pathologists, and then with physicians, creating a ‘collective intelligence’ that delivers reliable, contextual results.
Photo: IBM Watson
