Laboratory Corporation of America will soon offer a real-time HIV test from Roche Diagnostics, the company said Monday.
According to LabCorp, it is the first company to offer the Roche test known as COBAS AmpliPrep/COBAS TaqMan.
The test quantifies the amount of virus in a person’s blood in real time and in an automated format.
The test was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on May 11.
Doctors can use test information to establish a baseline HIV infection level before treatment of patients and to monitor patients’ responses during treatment, LabCorp said.
“Our agreement to make available this state-of-the-art HIV test further illustrates LabCorp’s continuing commitment to patient care and scientific leadership,” said Myla P. Lai-Goldman, M.D., Executive Vice President, Chief Scientific Officer and Medical Director of LabCorp. “We’re proud that we will be offering a test that will allow patients to receive treatment tailored to their particular level of infection, which will lead to more successful management of the virus.
"Furthermore," he added, "by fully automating sample preparation, amplification and detection in a standardized process, we will eliminate a number of manual steps and enhance the total quality process.”
