Healthcare professionals often have to rely on slow, complicated, incomplete, unreliable tests to identify pathogens of infectious diseases and accompanying antimicrobial resistance genes, resulting in suboptimal patient treatment and management. 

Clinicians face the following day-to-day challenges:

• Difficulty determining the infectious cause 
• The wrong test(s), or no test(s) are ordered
• Increasing costs due to additional testing
• Inappropriate patient care due, in part, to the use of broad-spectrum antimicrobials
• Risk of adverse outcomes and patient dissatisfaction
• Risk of pathogen spread and outbreaks

Additionally, the trend for easier and lower cost access to care has shifted patient care to ambulatory settings. This trend started several years ago but was accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic. Testing is no longer “lab exclusive” and can occur closer to the patient. Point-of-care testing (POCT) has developed mainly because it is convenient, easy to use, fast and can provide actionable results.²

POCT still has its challenges, especially in the diagnosis of respiratory tract infections (RTIs), which are some of the leading causes of disease worldwide and the most frequent infections among acute illnesses.³ RTIs can be caused by viruses or bacteria, and without a proper diagnosis,   unnecessary antibiotics may often be prescribed to patients, leading to the global rise of antimicrobial resistance. While POCT has been developing over the last few years, testing for only 2-3 pathogens may lead to many missed infections and/or co-infections.⁴ Clinicians cannot rule out co-infections with other respiratory pathogens when diagnosing SARS-CoV-2 infections, nor can they rule out COVID-19 by detecting non-SARS-CoV-2 respiratory pathogens.⁵

bioMérieux offers syndromic testing solutions for both labs and the point of care.

Syndromic PCR Solutions for Lab Testing with the BIOFIRE^® FILMARRAY^® TORCH System

The BIOFIRE TORCH System uses multiplex PCR technology to simultaneously test for a comprehensive grouping of targets in about an hour. This is a game-changer for infectious disease diagnostics, arming clinicians with the power of molecular PCR testing with a rapid, easy-to-use approach. BIOFIRE syndromic PCR testing provides proven operational, clinical, and economic benefits with BIOFIRE FILMARRAY Panels that are the right test, the first time for laboratories and healthcare providers.

Rapid Results from Syndromic Testing with the BIOFIRE TORCH System has the potential to:

• Improve timing of patient care decisions. 
• Reduce unnecessary or ancillary testing.
• Improve patient outcomes and antimicrobial stewardship.

Syndromic PCR Solutions for Point-of-Care Testing with the BIOFIRE^® SPOTFIRE^® System:

The SPOTFIRE System is designed to bring central laboratory diagnostic results to the decentralized point-of-care (POC) clinical setting. With a turnaround time of about 15 minutes, SPOTFIRE Respiratory Panels provide actionable answers onsite, which may help inform patient management decisions while optimizing care and antimicrobial stewardship. 

Syndromic Testing with the SPOTFIRE System has the potential to:

• Provide fast, accurate, and comprehensive diagnostic results to support clinical decisions.
  
• Improve patient satisfaction using the right test, the first time to detect multiple pathogens. 
• Reduce unnecessary tests, including expensive send-out tests.