‍

Region Hovedstaden: Decision support for treating blood clots in cancer

Client

Region Hovedstaden

Industry

Healthcare

Services

UX/UI Design

Platform- and API architecture

Integration

User testing

React

Ruby on Rails

The wrong blood thinner is a real risk

For most people, blood clots in cancer patients aren't something they think about much. For the patients, it's a very sensitive area. Blood clots are usually treated with blood thinners, but giving the wrong one can be risky.

With many hundreds of different cancer treatments and several blood-thinning drugs, the interactions between the medicines are more than one doctor can keep track of alone. The clinical term is CAT: cancer-associated thrombosis.

One doctor, little time and a gut feeling

Often a single doctor had to decide alone whether a cancer patient should have one treatment or another. There were neither the tools nor the time to look into how the different drugs interact.

So the decision was made on very little data and partly on gut feeling. That carried the risk of choosing the least risky option rather than the one that was best for the patient.

Together with our partners, we wanted to guide, train and support oncologists and cardiologists in those decisions, and save them time while doing it.

A Swiss Army knife for a difficult assessment

Easy enough to use in the middle of treatment

Making data available wasn't enough. The tool had to be easy enough for a doctor to pull up in the middle of a treatment.

We created a web app with a simple interface that strikes a good balance between level of detail and input, while still giving the doctor a result they can use. The result is based on a simple algorithm that can be extended with more data over time. That way, the CAT app ties speed, guidance and data interpretation closely to doctors' daily work.

Knowledge, skills and a better strategy

The project has both explored how treatment can be improved and supported doctors in their daily challenges. When this case was written in 2022, the goals included:

Knowledge: gaining insight into the factors that affect the choice of antithrombotic treatment
Skills: using the web app to get a supporting perspective on treatment
Purpose: assessing the best antithrombotic treatment strategy for CAT

Next step: the patients

At the time, the idea was for the platform to get a patient-facing part in the long run. Then the patient's basic data could be used directly, and consent and the data foundation would become much stronger.

In healthcare, the job is to shape the right solutions, and we do it with a close eye on ethics, compliance and data protection.