GE Healthcare, GSK Collaborate on Commercial Oncology Testing

GE Healthcare’s Clarient Diagnostic Services subsidiary is collaborating with GlaxoSmithKline to establish a network of clinical laboratories to improve access to diagnostic testing for cancer patients. The standardized service will give pharmaceutical and healthcare organizations the ability to offer diagnostic testing anywhere Clarient labs exist.

The labs, which will be operated by GE Healthcare, will offer a subscription-based service aimed at identifying genetic mutations associated with different tumor types, GE said Tuesday.

Initially, the laboratory testing will focus on more than 70 melanoma-related mutations such as BRAF V600E and V600K. As the network of labs develops, the testing will expand into other tumor types, the company said.

Aliso Viejo, Calif.-based Clarient will use its clinical laboratory, pathology and genomics expertise to certify the labs and generate diagnostic data on metastatic melanoma patients. The first labs should be operational in Russia and Brazil in early 2015, GE said. — Kellen Owings

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