Point-of-care testing
The non home and self testing point of care (POC) market has two general segments:
- Hospital POC testing - usually an extension of the central lab testing and providing immediate turnaround of results in the operating room, ICU or casualty department
- Decentralized testing - including physician’s clinics and offices, nursing homes, pharmacies and other non-institutional settings in which healthcare providers perform diagnostic tests
Biosensia’s RapiPlex platform addresses both these market segments, in particular for rapid immunodiagnostic assay applications.
Several macroeconomic factors are driving the move from traditional central laboratory based testing to decentralised POC testing. The current challenging economic environment is driving cost cutting within healthcare systems.
Multiplex Analysis
The RapiPlex platform drives the cost per test down, as it can perform multiplex analysis from a single patient sample, such as for:
- A sexually transmitted disease panel (syphilis, gonorrhea, herpes)
- An infant pediatric infection panel (measles, mumps, rubella)
Time-sensitive treatment, such as in using cardiac markers to diagnose a myocardial infarction rapidly, is also driving the need for rapid testing and rapid results.
These factors, coupled with a significant improvement in the reliability of POC test results, have increased acceptance of POC testing by hospital central laboratories.
POC Requirements
The requirements for POC testing align excellently with the RapiPlex technology platform given its intrinsic low cost of goods, ability to provide rapid results, ease of use and quantitative assay readout, without the need for an expensive, central laboratory-based analyser.
The RapiPlex reader incorporates the ability to self-reference and a number of control mechanisms for internal calibration and quality assurance.
Market Segments
Excluding home and self testing, the RapiPlex platform can be applied to the following POC market sub segments:
- Infectious disease testing
- Drugs of abuse
- Cardiac markers
- “Other” – a broad range of applications including but not limited to, kidney markers, allergy testing, hormone testing