The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) has named a former IBM Watson executive as the new CEO of its CancerLinQ big data platform.
Cory Wiegert was most recently vice president of product management for IBM Watson Health. Prior to joining IBM, Wiegert held positions with Sterling Commerce, Siebel Systems Inc., Centura Software and Safety-Kleen.
Kevin Fitzpatrick stepped down as the nonprofit CancerLinQ’s CEO in April 2018. Richard Schilsky, M.D., who was serving as interim CEO of CancerLinQ, will continue his role as ASCO's chief medical officer.
CancerLinQ collects and analyzes data from cancer patients at practices nationwide, drawing from electronic health records, to inform and improve the quality of cancer care. Its database contains more than a million cancer patient records. The effort has two major components:
• The CancerLinQ quality improvement and data-sharing platform for oncology practices,
• CancerLinQ Discovery, which provides access to high-quality, de-identified datasets derived from the patient data to academic researchers, non-profit organizations, government agencies, industry, and others in the oncology community.
CancerLinQ LLC also has established a number of collaborations with government and nonprofit entities -- including American Society of Radiation Oncology, Food and Drug Administration, and the National Cancer Institute -- as well as industry through its collaborators AstraZeneca, Tempus, and Concerto HealthAI.
In a statement, ASCO CEO and CancerLinQ LLC Board of Governors Chair Clifford A. Hudis, M.D., said Wiegert’s arrival “comes at a pivotal time, as we are quickly building on and improving CancerLinQ's core quality improvement platform for oncologists and data analytics services for the broader cancer community."
As CEO, Wiegert will be tasked with developing new solutions to help oncology practices improve the day-to-day care they provide their patients and continuing to serve CancerLinQ collaborators.
