NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Veracyte said after the close of the market on Monday that Cigna has issued a positive coverage decision for the Afirma Gene Expression Classifier test.
The decision means that about 13 million Cigna customers will have access to Veracyte's thyroid cancer test as a covered benefit. Cigna's policy takes effect immediately, Veracyte said.
The Afirma GEC test helps physicians determine which patients may need surgery as part of a thyroid cancer diagnosis. Veracyte's solution combines the assessment of thyroid nodule fine needle aspiration samples by specialist cytopathologists with the Afirma GEC genomic test to identify patients whose nodules are actually benign in spite of indeterminate cytopathology results.
Cigna joins other payors, including Medicare, Aetna, Humana, and UnitedHealthcare in providing coverage for the test.
Veracyte recently said in its third quarter financial results announcement that it received 12,417 fine needle aspiration samples during the quarter, and the Afirma GEC test continued to be performed at a range of about 20 percent of FNA samples received. The South San Francisco, Calif.-based company went public in early November.