Varian announces ten-year transformational oncology collaboration with Ballad Health

Varian, a Siemens Healthineers company, announced a ten-year agreement with Ballad Health, to bring advanced oncology treatment services to serve patients in rural communities across the Appalachian Highlands in Northeast Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, northwestern North Carolina, and southeastern Kentucky. 

The transformational oncology collaboration with the Johnson City, Tennessee-based health system, is designed to deliver advanced treatment technology through a highly integrated digital network across Ballad Health by accelerating the patient journey from screening to survivorship. 

The agreement, one of the largest in Varian’s history, includes a portfolio of products and services supporting a unified oncology ecosystem. Using Varian’s Aria Core oncology management solution and the Varian Executive Partnership program, care teams across Ballad Health will be able to access greater visibility into patient data to gain deeper insights needed to deliver more personalized care. Aria Core, a cloud-based system, will replace a series of separate, localized systems to provide a holistic view of patient information. The Varian Executive Partnership program will support implementation of streamlined, consistent workflows, and access to actionable data insights. Upgrades to the Eclipse treatment planning platform will enable next generation advanced planning to deliver more consistent, tighter control and higher quality plans than versions currently in place.

To optimize its technology implementation and support adoption, Ballad Health team members and clinicians will leverage Varian’s Advanced Oncology Solutions (AOS) Professional Services to provide operational support and consulting services to best serve its patient population for the entirety of the agreement. In addition to consulting services, Varian’s AOS team will also provide professional services for medical physics and dosimetry. 

The new, decade-long collaboration includes eight TrueBeam linear accelerators and one Ethos adaptive radiotherapy system to be delivered to six sites in Tennessee and Virginia, enabling Ballad Health to accelerate its schedule to implement newer linac technology. Under the agreement, Varian will also support a technology roadmap, enabling Ballad Health to adapt to future technology advancements, including the flexibility to select different system configurations, installation dates, and sites as market needs change. In addition to support for technology enablement, Varian will provide market analytics and gap analyses to support Ballad Health in making informed technology decisions.