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diagnostic blood tests for multiple sclerosis
Utah firm developing blood tests for multiple sclerosis
By Brian Maffly | The Salt Lake Tribune
December 14, 2011
A Salt Lake City company has received a boost in its quest to develop diagnostic tests for multiple sclerosis, which could improve the lives of those with the devastating, unpredictable autoimmune disorder that disrupts nerve function.
The National Multiple Sclerosis Society on Wednesday announced a $622,000 pledge, through its nonprofit subsidiary Fast Forward, to Lineagen Inc., a molecular diagnostic company that was spun off from the University of Utah in 2005. The grant will fund ongoing U. research programs at the labs of neurologist John Rose, a leading clinical MS researcher, and his longtime collaborator geneticist Mark Leppert, Lineagen's chief science adviser and co-founder.
To advance understanding of MS, Rose has recruited some 500 patients through his clinic, and compared their genetic data with the pedigrees of relatives in the university's Utah Population Database, which includes medical and demographic information on more than 6.5 million individuals. Meanwhile, Leppert's lab has helped identify genetic profiles associated with the disease.
Lineagen (lin-ee-a-GEN) officials hope marrying these clinical and genetic approaches will create new techniques for determining whether a patient has MS and how severely the disease will affect them.
"John looks at various nongenetic markers [certain proteins in the blood or antibodies in spinal fluid]. They correlated that with a person's genetics and that leads to a predictive opportunity," said Michael Paul, Lineagen president and CEO. "The funding from Fast Forward will accelerate this clinical program, allowing the collaborative team to evaluate and affirm a broad number of biomarkers simultaneously, with the collective goal of delivering our best testing services to physicians and patients."
This research team is tackling a crucial need, according to Timothy Coetzee, the MS society's chief research officer.
"It's a high-risk science. We are thrilled to partner with them," Coetzee said. "This is a group that's done it already in another disease. The company has an autism test that's generating revenue."
Unevenly distributed around the world, MS is much more common in counties at higher latitudes, yet some ethnic groups such as Finland's Samis and New Zealand's Maori are at low risk, suggesting a genetic role. Some 400,000 people have the disease in the United States, with 200 new cases diagnosed every week, according to the National MS society. Utah has one of the highest rates of MS in the country.
The disease cannot be cured, but its debilitating symptoms can be managed through powerful drugs that are expensive and create side effects.
"Starting treatment when it's not appropriate is a huge negative," said Alex Lindell, Lineagen's senior director for product management. A credible diagnosis is difficult before a patient is clearly symptomatic, but by then treatment options narrow and outcomes are less promising. A diagnosis, usually confirmed through MRI brain scans, requires a patient to experience at least two isolated neurological episodes associated with the loss of the fatty sheaths that encase nerve tissue.
"There's a period where symptoms can start, but it can be two months between episodes or two years. They don't know if the person has MS. It's a difficult diagnostic situation," Leppert said.
Lineagen's technique could enable physicians to more quickly rule out other neurological disorders in diagnosing patients with MS, then predict their responsiveness to different treatment options, Coetzee said. The MS society funding will help validate it in a clinical setting.
A major goal of the program is to predict the trajectory of this notoriously fickle disease in a particular patient, information could help physicians optimize therapy.
"There are different courses of this illness," Leppert said. "We have a lot of good therapies now. Can you match treatment modalities up with the different observations of proteins, DNA and antibodies?"
Researchers hope to correlate fluctuations in known MS biomarkers with how the disease plays out in a patient.
"One of the most critical challenges is to find answers to key questions, such as how do we identify those patients who are more likely to experience disease progression and how do we determine patients' potential responsiveness to therapy? With this important funding provided by Fast Forward, we will rapidly gain key insights that we believe can have a profound impact on the lives of people living with MS," Rose said.
***@**** —
About multiple sclerosis
MS is a disorder in which the body destroys its own myelin, a fatty substance that covers nerve tissue. Nerve impulses are disrupted, causing a variety of symptoms.
It is two to three times more common in women.
Genetics plays a role: In the general population, MS occurs in one of every 750 people. The risk rises to one in 40 for anyone who has a parent, sibling or child with the disease.
Utah has one of the highest rates of MS in the U.S.
Source • National MS Society
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/53115605-78/disease-lineagen-genetic-patient.html.csp
By Brian Maffly | The Salt Lake Tribune
December 14, 2011
A Salt Lake City company has received a boost in its quest to develop diagnostic tests for multiple sclerosis, which could improve the lives of those with the devastating, unpredictable autoimmune disorder that disrupts nerve function.
The National Multiple Sclerosis Society on Wednesday announced a $622,000 pledge, through its nonprofit subsidiary Fast Forward, to Lineagen Inc., a molecular diagnostic company that was spun off from the University of Utah in 2005. The grant will fund ongoing U. research programs at the labs of neurologist John Rose, a leading clinical MS researcher, and his longtime collaborator geneticist Mark Leppert, Lineagen's chief science adviser and co-founder.
To advance understanding of MS, Rose has recruited some 500 patients through his clinic, and compared their genetic data with the pedigrees of relatives in the university's Utah Population Database, which includes medical and demographic information on more than 6.5 million individuals. Meanwhile, Leppert's lab has helped identify genetic profiles associated with the disease.
Lineagen (lin-ee-a-GEN) officials hope marrying these clinical and genetic approaches will create new techniques for determining whether a patient has MS and how severely the disease will affect them.
"John looks at various nongenetic markers [certain proteins in the blood or antibodies in spinal fluid]. They correlated that with a person's genetics and that leads to a predictive opportunity," said Michael Paul, Lineagen president and CEO. "The funding from Fast Forward will accelerate this clinical program, allowing the collaborative team to evaluate and affirm a broad number of biomarkers simultaneously, with the collective goal of delivering our best testing services to physicians and patients."
This research team is tackling a crucial need, according to Timothy Coetzee, the MS society's chief research officer.
"It's a high-risk science. We are thrilled to partner with them," Coetzee said. "This is a group that's done it already in another disease. The company has an autism test that's generating revenue."
Unevenly distributed around the world, MS is much more common in counties at higher latitudes, yet some ethnic groups such as Finland's Samis and New Zealand's Maori are at low risk, suggesting a genetic role. Some 400,000 people have the disease in the United States, with 200 new cases diagnosed every week, according to the National MS society. Utah has one of the highest rates of MS in the country.
The disease cannot be cured, but its debilitating symptoms can be managed through powerful drugs that are expensive and create side effects.
"Starting treatment when it's not appropriate is a huge negative," said Alex Lindell, Lineagen's senior director for product management. A credible diagnosis is difficult before a patient is clearly symptomatic, but by then treatment options narrow and outcomes are less promising. A diagnosis, usually confirmed through MRI brain scans, requires a patient to experience at least two isolated neurological episodes associated with the loss of the fatty sheaths that encase nerve tissue.
"There's a period where symptoms can start, but it can be two months between episodes or two years. They don't know if the person has MS. It's a difficult diagnostic situation," Leppert said.
Lineagen's technique could enable physicians to more quickly rule out other neurological disorders in diagnosing patients with MS, then predict their responsiveness to different treatment options, Coetzee said. The MS society funding will help validate it in a clinical setting.
A major goal of the program is to predict the trajectory of this notoriously fickle disease in a particular patient, information could help physicians optimize therapy.
"There are different courses of this illness," Leppert said. "We have a lot of good therapies now. Can you match treatment modalities up with the different observations of proteins, DNA and antibodies?"
Researchers hope to correlate fluctuations in known MS biomarkers with how the disease plays out in a patient.
"One of the most critical challenges is to find answers to key questions, such as how do we identify those patients who are more likely to experience disease progression and how do we determine patients' potential responsiveness to therapy? With this important funding provided by Fast Forward, we will rapidly gain key insights that we believe can have a profound impact on the lives of people living with MS," Rose said.
***@**** —
About multiple sclerosis
MS is a disorder in which the body destroys its own myelin, a fatty substance that covers nerve tissue. Nerve impulses are disrupted, causing a variety of symptoms.
It is two to three times more common in women.
Genetics plays a role: In the general population, MS occurs in one of every 750 people. The risk rises to one in 40 for anyone who has a parent, sibling or child with the disease.
Utah has one of the highest rates of MS in the U.S.
Source • National MS Society
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/53115605-78/disease-lineagen-genetic-patient.html.csp
DV- thanks for bringing up this one - Shell is really big on biomarkers being a big key to our treatment in just a few years... it fits with this company's efforts.
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