NEW YORK – OpGen announced Wednesday the expansion of its strategic collaboration with the New York State Department of Health after the firm hit all of its milestones under the first-year contract.
As a result, the collaboration is proceeding into a second-year contract.
The collaboration's goal is to develop a solution to detect, track, and manage antimicrobial-resistant infections at healthcare facilities across the state. Its first-year pilot phase goal was to develop an infectious disease digital health and precision medicine platform connecting NYSDOH and healthcare institutions that uses genomic microbiology to surveil and control antimicrobial resistance.
The final milestone of the first year's contract was met in the first quarter of this year. OpGen said it will work with the department of health's Wadsworth Center, the participating health systems, and other collaborators like Infectious Disease Connect, a telemedicine partner that offers infectious disease physicians and specialty services to hospitals, to expand the reach of the platform, increase testing volume, and enhance data collection.
Through the collaboration, OpGen is offering its Acuitas AMR Gene Panel for rapid detection of multidrug-resistant bacterial pathogens and its Acuitas Lighthouse software for pathogen tracking. OpGen submitted its gene panel to the US Food and Drug Administration for 510(k) clearance last year but is still waiting on a decision after requests from the agency for additional information.
The second-year NYSDOH contract is valued at up to $450,000 and is focused on implementing the Acuitas panel and bioinformatics into routine care, offering up to 3,500 tests to be run as part of the contract, an OpGen spokesperson said. The first-year contract's value was $1.5 million and focused on R&D and building the Acuitas Lighthouse software infrastructure.
OpGen CEO Oliver Scacht noted in a statement that further project expansion could include exploring methods of SARS-CoV-2 tracking.