Next-gen cancer diagnosis lab opens at Skolkovo

In late January the Russian startup UNIM opened the country’s first digital cancer lab at Skolkovo, the international tech hub under completion on the outskirts of Moscow.

UNIM uses Digital Pathology – the conversion of glass slides into digital slides – to allow patients to obtain a histological, immunohistochemical or molecular analysis of their tumour and consultation on treatment and rehabilitation from the top specialists in their field, regardless of the patient’s location and without the need to travel to another city or abroad.

“We work with the top specialists across Russia and around the world, from countries including the U.S., U.K., the Czech Republic, Norway and Italy,” said Alexei Remez, director general of UNIM, at the lab’s official opening on Wednesday.

Currently, it is very common (estimates vary from 50 to 80 percent of diagnoses) for patients with suspected tumours to be given inaccurate diagnoses. This can result in people undergoing operations and chemotherapy for cancers they do not have, others being given the wrong kind of treatment for the cancer they have, or people with cancer going undiagnosed.