report out, page-10

According to this article that you posted under one of your many nics it seems sales are not that far away Pat.

Thursday, October 18, 2007
California QFT news
Source: The Signal

FDA Approves New TB Test

Wednesday October 17, 2007

Tammy Marashlian
Signal Staff Writer

With the recent FDA approval of its new blood test to detect tuberculosis, Valencia company Cellestis Inc. hopes that the days of the 100-year-old tuberculin skin test will soon be gone.

Known as QuantiFERON-TB Gold In-Tube, the test will save time and money for clinicians because it was designed to reduce the number of false positives, said Mark Boyle, senior vice president of sales and marketing for Cellestis Inc.

It took 18 months for the FDA to approve the test and Cellestis hopes it will be available to clinicians in the next couple of weeks.

When administered, TST measures the amount of swelling on the patient's arm to assess whether they have TB, but there are many reasons a patient's arm can swell, Boyle said.

For example, Boyle said immigrants who have had a BCG shot - a vaccination other countries use to prevent TB - prior to coming to the U.S. can test positive for TB without actually having it.

"There's a large proportion of the population that comes up positive who do not have TB," Boyle said. "That leads to wasted money on treating and testing people with false positives."

Boyle continued to explain that measuring the swelling on a patient's arm can also be subjective because the swelling can vary, preventing clinicians from determining a clear positive or negative diagnosis.

With the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's estimate that between 10 million and 15 million people worldwide are infected with TB, Boyle said the key is being able to find and treat the people that really need it and not waste resources on treating the people who are misdiagnosed.

That's where Boyle said Cellestis' new test comes into play. QFT detects cell immune responses to proteins specifically associated with TB. As a blood test, QFT reduces any possible side effects or adverse reactions. Furthermore, Boyle said the test results can be available within a day, which is faster than the several days it takes to process the current test; also no patient follow-up is necessary.

Boyle said the test was originally designed around 15 years ago in Australia - where Cellestis' parent company is based in Melbourne - to battle TB in cattle. When researchers saw that the test was effective in testing cattle, they decided to make a version for humans.

Boyle said Cellestis is currently promoting QFT so that it can be available in the coming weeks. The company estimates that about 17 million people get tested for TB every year.

"Our initial goal is to take 10 percent of that number," Boyle said, adding that the test will target people who have a high likelihood of getting TB.

To find out more information about Cellestis Inc., visit www.cellestis.com.

tmarashlian@ the-signal.com

Copyright:The Signal

Posted by rog at 5:36 AM





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Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom) Having bought a few shares in the publicly listed Australian company Cellestis (ASX code CST) on a whim, I became interested in the field of disease control and how it affected my shareholding. After learning some more, I became an investor and increased my holding.

This blog is an attempt to draw the seemingly disparate threads of business, disease and politics into one 'big picture.'

The views expressed here are entirely mine, or those of guest authors. Apart from the standard notices to shareholders Cellestis has no input to this blog.