Latest News

  • An Epidemic of Septicemia?

    THCB | CDC says that 86% of healthcare dollars are spent on patients with chronic illness, and the largest, fastest, and most preventable diagnosis is the most acute of all: septicemia. 13% of the time, patients die.

    Jun 17, 2016
  • Could CRISPR gene-cutting tool transform disease diagnostics?

    STAT | The gene-editing technique CRISPR has been used for the first time to create a diagnostic that can differentiate between two strains of the Zika virus.

    Jun 15, 2016
  • Walgreens Finally Walked. Heres Why Thats So Bad For Theranos

    Forbes | Yesterday, Walgreens, the U.S. drug-store arm of global pharmacy giant Walgreens Boots Alliance, finally terminated its deal with Theranos, the blood-testing startup that once aimed to disrupt the laboratory business but now is fighting for its survival.

    Jun 13, 2016
  • Invitae Launches Customer Service Toolkit

    Diagnostics World  Invitae Corporation launched CancerCHECK (Cancer Complete Hereditary Evaluation Clinic Kit), this week, a comprehensive toolkit that provides checklists, information, and customized support for clinicians considering genetic testing for hereditary breast, ovarian, and colorectal cancers.

    Jun 8, 2016
  • New blood test may be able to find best antidepressant match study says

    Washington Post | British scientists took a major step toward bringing personalized medicine to mental health on Tuesday, announcing that they had developed a blood test that can accurately predict whether or not you'll respond to the conventional, commonly prescribed antidepressants on the market.

    Jun 8, 2016
  • A Visual Guide to Antibiotic Resistance

    Scientific American Blog Network | Illustration breaks down the microscopic mechanisms behind a global threat

    Jun 3, 2016
  • Definiens, MolecularMD Sign Patient Stratification Assay Agreement

    Diagnostics World Brief | Definiens and MolecularMD announced a partnership today to combine MolecularMD’s expertise in specialty diagnostic assays with Definiens’ quantitative tissue read-outs. Together the two companies hope to offer patient stratification using quantitative tissue assays for clinical development and diagnostics.

    Jun 2, 2016
  • Driving Innovation in the Microbiome Space

    Diagnostics World News | Trillions of bacteria dwell in, on, and among us in the oceans, air, soil, plants, and animals, and on May 13, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy announced its plan to drive research exploring the microbiome. The National Microbiome Initiative (NMI) will invest $121 million to support research on the microbiome, develop technologies to study and share results, and expand the microbiome workforce.

    Jun 1, 2016
  • Is a real-world wearable tricorder logical?

    ReadWrite | Wearables are a great start to monitoring your level of fitness, but they have further to go to give you and your doctor a detailed view of your health.

    May 27, 2016
  • FDA Issues Warning Letter to Qiagen for TB Test

    Diagnostics World | Qiagen received a warning letter from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) last week detailing repeated complaints for high false positive rates for Qiagen’s QuantiFERON-TB Gold (QFT) test device—its blood test used for diagnosing tuberculosis.

    May 25, 2016
  • Two newborn deaths in the same family set off a race to solve a medical mystery

    STAT | Whole exome sequencing identifies a mutation that claimed the lives of two newborns.

    May 24, 2016
  • Diagnostics World Preview of the Next Generation Diagnostics Summit

    Diagnostics World News | Diagnostics World News will be attending the Next Generation Diagnostics Summit in Washington, D.C. this August, and we are looking forward to four days filled with diagnostics challenges, solutions, and advances. The Summit includes 13 different conference programs, and here is just some of what we have highlighted.

    May 20, 2016
  • Theranos Last Defense Crumbles

    Forbes | Until now, Theranos and those close to the company could claim that its problems were limited to its laboratory in Newark, California, and that it had really done a fine job in Arizona, where most of its testing centers are. That claim lies demolished.

    May 19, 2016
  • Foundation Medicine Awarded Patent for Dx Test

    Diagnostics World Brief | Foundation Medicine, Inc. today announced that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has issued U.S. patent number 9,340,830, entitled, “Optimization of Multigene Analysis of Tumor Samples.” The patent, which is assigned to Foundation Medicine, includes fundamental claims describing methods of analyzing a cancer patient’s tissue or blood specimen to detect multiple classes of genomic alterations.

    May 17, 2016
  • FDA Issues Draft Guidance on NGS Sequencing for Infectious Disease Diagnostics

    RAPS | FDA is proposing to regulate genetic sequencing diagnostic tests as complete systems that encompass all processes from specimen collection through clinical results.

    May 13, 2016
  • Embattled Blood Lab Theranos Makes a Bid to Regain Confidence

    The New York Times | The blood-testing company, which is under criminal investigation, is replacing its chief operating officer and expanding its board.

    May 12, 2016
  • DIY Blood Tests? Theres A Downside To Ordering Your Own Shots

    NPR.org | It's legal to order diagnostic blood tests without consulting a doctor in many states. But critics say healthy patients can go down a rabbit hole of invasive assays and unnecessary treatments.

    May 12, 2016
  • Community BRCA Testing Initiative at Halfway Point

    Diagnostics World An area-wide genetic testing initiative in Alabama is six-months in, and more than 1,000 test kits have been processed. About 4% of the tests have returned mutations.

    May 11, 2016