Talk

This is a guest blog post from our VP of Clinical Affairs, Trisha Brown:

The healthcare system is evolving as individuals begin to step outside of their local, or traditional, healthcare resources to find what they’re looking for. This is well-illustrated by the medical genetic testing industry, where there is a growing trend in direct-to-consumer (DTC) marketing. In response, the regulatory environment is scrutinizing the entire industry and how each company interacts with individuals.

I recently spoke on this topic at the Dark Report-sponsored Executive War College on Laboratory and Pathology Management held in Miami (where it was slightly cooler than San Francisco for a change). The audience was made up of about 650 C-suite executives and directors of clinical labs — from the big names to small pathology labs and hospitals. A major theme at the conference was that the ability to compete in the lab testing space is not about the testing itself anymore, but rather service, service, service. Labs are concerned with everything from customer phone service to how they partner with physicians to enable them to do their jobs better by providing information and effective results reporting.

I opened the second day of the conference with a presentation on the virtual medical genetic testing landscape and how it has become a DTC trend, with multiple companies offering a range of services, often at the click of a button. The regulatory scrutiny that is growing along with the industry is important because the heightened scrutiny will extend to all of the clinical laboratories — as the Secretary’s Advisory Committee on Genetics, Health and Society put it, it is becoming “increasingly difficult to distinguish genetic testing from other complex laboratory testing.”

There is also a tendency to lump all of the companies, including DNA Direct, together into one big DTC bundle, which is inaccurate given the varying service offerings. DNA Direct, for example, is committed to assessing individuals pre-test to ensure the right people get the right test at the right time. We’re also the first and only company to create transparent standards and guidelines for web-enabled services and we follow the standard medical guidelines for applicable tests; this is appealing to individuals looking for a reliable and medically sound testing experience.

I gave the example of a young Ashkenazi Jewish couple who visited their doctor to discuss carrier screening prior to their honeymoon. Unfortunately, their insurance wouldn’t cover the tests since they weren’t currently pregnant, and the cost was going to be $4,000. The couple decided to go shopping online and came to DNA Direct, where the couple was counseled to test one person at a time to eliminate unnecessary tests and costs. The groom-to-be took the bundle of tests, at a cost of $1,200, and only tested positive for the enzyme associated with Tay-Sachs. Thus his fiancée needed one $300 test to confirm whether they were at risk for offspring with any relevant diseases. This is a nice example of how individuals are taking control of their own healthcare. The opportunity for individual labs, of course, is to better educate physicians on selective testing in order to avoid costly, extraneous tests.

This is DNA Direct’s philosophy — our genetic testing tools and services empower individuals and physicians by providing guidance fortesting and context around results. We also host a number of services for labs who are trying to enhance their pre- and post-analytical solutions for physicians, so they can improve their service and keep up with healthcare innovation.

This entry was posted on Saturday, May 17th, 2008 at 8:37 pm and is filed under DNA Direct News, Privacy, Legislation & Policy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.