Philips sheds light on the future of personalized cancer care

Royal Philips (NYSE: PHG, AXE: PHIA) recently held a roundtable discussion as part of its wide range of activities during Arab Health 2016, to address the challenges of cancer care in the region as well as raise awareness around the need to have an earlier cancer diagnosis. The activity is in line with Philips continued efforts to delivering connected oncology care solutions across the health continuum – from healthy living to disease prevention, diagnosis, treatment and homecare.

The meeting included a number of prominent thought leaders from the region who discussed issues facing both healthcare providers and patients with the purpose to improve cancer care delivery. Cancer accounts for more than 10% of all deaths in most Middle Eastern countries, and currently 1 in 3 women and 1 in 2 men are diagnosed globally with the disease in their lifetime. The region’s ageing and growing population will result in an increasing incidence of cancer by 2030. 

Philips is connecting care across the health continuum, and believes data integration as well as real time analytics is core to deliver a value added approach to personalizing cancer care. The company’s solutions help make diagnosis quicker, exact and safer for the patient. The aim is to integrate clinical and patient data in one place, to potentially help clinicians improve multi-disciplinary collaboration, decision making and treatment outcomes while supporting patients during chemotherapy to improve the overall quality of life. 

Arjen Radder, Philips CEO Middle East and Turkey said, “Philips is addressing the growing need for a new approach to cancer care.  We strive to deliver better, more personalized care to patients while reducing healthcare costs. This is done by constantly looking at better ways to locate cancers earlier, diagnosing them more precisely, making therapies more accurate with minimal invasive and taking a personalized approach in giving the patient the best possible care.”

“Not only are we providing integrated ways to collect and analyze information but our clinical and biological expertise enables clinicians to interpret this data and choose the optimal treatment for the individual patient,” added Radder.

While the vast majority of cancer diagnoses are made or confirmed by a pathologist, the increased demand for pathology services continues to grow. Philips IntelliSite Pathology Solution and advanced visualization helps care providers reach informed decisions through enhanced productivity with high resolution digital images, collaboration features and case management tools. 

The roundtable included the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) between Philips and the King Hussein Cancer Centre to collaborate more closely on fighting cancer in the Middle East. The MoU will see the two partners working together to implement cancer awareness campaigns, setting up continual medical education programs relating to the practice oncology, and helping to improve quality assurances throughout the field. 

Philips forms long term partnerships with those connected to the patient care journey to develop integrated solutions supporting them in making care informed, efficient and sustainable.  The company helps make this possible with solutions for accurate decision-making to enable patient specific therapy with a primary objective of redefining the future of personalized oncology.