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Humana to Cover NanoString Technologies Prosigna Breast Cancer Test

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) – NanoString Technologies announced today that health insurer Humana has issued a positive coverage decision for its Prosigna Breast Cancer Gene Signature Assay.

The decision provides Humana's more than 13 million members with access to the test.

"This positive coverage decision is in line with updated ASCO guidelines released in February of 2016, wherein Prosigna is considered medically necessary to assess the necessity of adjuvant chemotherapy in ER-positive, HER2-negative, node-negative breast cancer patients, when adjuvant chemotherapy is not precluded due to any other factor," the company said in a statement.

NanoString CEO Brad Gray added that Humana's decision was an "important milestone in making our Prosigna test available to all indicated patients."

Prosigna provides a numerical score to assess the risk of disease recurrence, based on the PAM50 gene signature and clinical variables. It runs on NanoString's nCounter Dx platform using RNA extracted from formalin-fixed paraffin embedded samples.

Humana is the latest insurer to cover Prosigna — Cigna and Aetna both announced their decisions to cover the test in May 2016.

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