NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) – Veracyte today said that it has signed a partnership with Fleury Medicine and Health to make its Afirma Gene Expression Classifier for thyroid cancer diagnosis available to patients in Brazil.
Fleury will exclusively offer the Afirma GEC through its diagnostics centers across Brazil. The genomic test will be offered when patients' thyroid nodule fine needle aspiration results are indeterminate following cytopathology review.
Genzyme, which serves as Veracyte's global co-promotion partner, will also promote to the test to physicians in Brazil. Samples will be sent to Veracyte's CLIA lab in South San Francisco, Calif., where the firm is based.
Veracyte said that nearly 100,000 thyroid nodule FNAs are performed each year on patients in Brazil, with 15 percent to 30 percent of such FNAs assumed to be inconclusive.
"Traditional techniques for evaluating thyroid nodules are limited, leading many patients to undergo surgery to remove all or part of their thyroids just to get a diagnostic result. These surgeries are invasive, costly and often result in lifelong thyroid hormone replacement therapy for the patient," Rosa Paula Mello Biscolla, specialist in endocrinology at Fleury Medicine and Health, said in a statement. "Use of the Afirma GEC will enable physicians to help many patients avoid a surgery they do not need."
Financial and other terms of the agreement were not disclosed.