Alliance to Develop Rapid Ischemia Test

A rapid point-of-care diagnostic test for ischemia is being codeveloped by Response Biomedical Crop. (Vancouver, Canada) and Ischemia Technologies Inc. (Denver, CO, USA). The test will be based on proprietary antibodies developed by Ischemia and will be designed to be used on Response Biomedical's Ramp test platform.

The two companies believe a rapid blood test to detect ischemia will provide a valuable tool that will aid doctors in diagnosing and treating patients with chest pain. The test can help them rule out heart attack and reduce the time a patient remains hospitalized. Moreover, it can help doctors identify ischemic patients before they progress to a heart attack, when treatment can prevent loss of heart muscle. The test would be used along with one or more cardiac markers for patients with chest pain.

This test, exclusive to Ramp in a point-of-care format, will further differentiate us from the competition, adding yet another assay to the developing menu of Ramp tests and demonstrating the versatility of the Ramp platform technology, said Humberto Reyes, chairman of Response Biomedical.

Response Biomedical has three Ramp tests for heart attack under development: troponin I, CK-MB, and myoglobin.