MINNEAPOLIS (Sept. 29, 2016) – Driven to improve patient care and reduce overall healthcare costs, Twin Cities-based pharmacogenomics company OneOme continues to grow its global network and availability of the RightMed™ test with the announcement of a new partnership with Centra Health. Centra’s Stroobants Cardiovascular Center in Lynchburg, VA, joins OneOme’s growing team of provider partners.
The RightMed test is a cost-effective, comprehensive, and clinically actionable pharmacogenomic test covering 22 genes, provided as a part of routine clinical care. The test helps healthcare providers easily make timely, evidenced-based, personalized prescription treatment decisions for more than 340 medications.
About half of the four billion prescriptions issued each year do not work as intended, and adverse drug reactions account for seven percent of hospital admissions and 20 percent of readmissions. Patients taking some classes of medication, such as cardiovascular prescriptions, may be most likely to benefit from taking the cheek-swab test – making a partnership with Centra Health’s Stroobants Cardiovascular Center a unique opportunity for the rural outpatient center to offer additional patient care benefits.
“As the field of genomics rapidly evolves, we’re able to learn more about how our unique genome influences our health,” said Associate Medical Director of Cardiovascular Services Mark D. Townsend, MD, Centra Health. “With specific understanding of how unique individuals metabolize prescription drugs, our patients will benefit directly from Centra providing the RightMed test.”
The test, which costs $249, is ordered by providers through a HIPAA-compliant portal at www.oneome.com, where results will be made available and retained. Results are tested at OneOme’s new CLIA-registered clinical laboratory in Minneapolis, which has been successfully running tests since early summer.
While anyone can take the test, it is most beneficial for patients with adverse drug reactions, cardiovascular drug prescriptions, medications that are not working, multiple prescription medications, and/or unwelcomed side effects from current medications.
“The Precision Medicine Initiative aims to provide better insights into the biological, environmental and behavior influences on diseases,” said Paul Owen, CEO of OneOme. “It’s our mission to build a comprehensive, affordable, and personalized analysis in pharmacogenomics, and the addition of partners such as Centra Health help make these insights accessible to patients.”
Available worldwide, RightMed is currently in use by Mayo Clinic Center for Individualized Medicine (CIM); in Canada through OneOme’s partnership with Medcan, Canada’s largest executive health clinic and a global leader in assessing clients’ overall well-being; and in Puerto Rico, Cuba and Dominican Republic through a partnership with High Profile Laboratory in Guaynabo, Puerto Rico. High Profiles Laboratory is an established, specialized provider of clinical and microbiological tests and a partner of Salus, a healthcare provider and a member of the Mayo Clinic Care Network.
Centra Health is located in central Virginia and was established in 1987 with the merger of Lynchburg General and Virginia Baptist hospitals. Centra serves more than 500,000 people throughout central and southern Virginia in 38 locations. Stroobants Cardiovascular Center is dedicated to the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of heart and vascular conditions – the leading cause of death in the United States.
The OneOme platform was co-developed and exclusively licensed from Mayo Clinic to bring pharmacogenomics into routine clinical care. OneOme is a privately held company backed by early-stage venture firm Invenshure, LLC, and Mayo Clinic. To learn more about OneOme, visit www.oneome.com.
Editor’s Note: Mayo Clinic has financial interest in the technology referenced in this news release. The revenue that Mayo Clinic will receive is used to support its not-for-profit mission in patient care, education and research.