The DiaGenic BCtect breast cancer test will be marketed in India through Religare SRL (formerly known as SRL Ranbaxy), a laboratory chain in South East Asia.
India was chosen as the first country for the introduction of BCtect after successful completion of a large study in the country. Clinical studies performed on a group of Indian women by DiaGenic have shown that the test can detect tumors early and accurately, in particular among younger (pre-menopausal) women and those with dense breasts.
The TaqMan Array manufactured for DiaGenic by Applied Biosystems consists of 96 TaqMan Gene Expression Assays pre-loaded multiple times on a 384-well micro fluidic card. These 384 simultaneous real-time PCR reactions are performed without the need to use liquid-handling robots or multichannel pipettors. The array is run on the Applied Biosystems 7900HT Fast Real-time PCR System by Labindia.
Peter Dansky, president of Applied Biosystems’ functional analysis division, said: “The TaqMan Arrays provide an ideal format for surveying gene expression markers based in their easy-to-use format, high sensitivity, and ability to facilitate standardization among laboratories for consistent and reliable results.”
Sanjeev Chaudhry, CEO of SRL, said: “We believe that BCtect will provide the perfect incentive for women to take charge of their health and undergo regular check-ups. Religare SRL will put in place intensive and extensive market-facing strategies to ensure rapid growth in the market, both locally and internationally, and will invest substantial amounts and efforts to inform the market on the availability of this new innovative test.”