While You Were Meeting: FDA Mails Letters to 14 More Genetic Test Providers
Earlier this week the FDA held a widely publicized two-day public meeting to discuss its planned regulation of laboratory developed tests (LDTs) (for more see: Day One Recap and Day Two Recap). Other than Monday morning, when the FDA presented background information on LDTs and some of the considerations that have pushed the Agency to pursue a “risk-based application of oversight to LDTs,” the top Agency officials at the meeting were conspicuously quiet. Elsewhere, however, the FDA was doing plenty of talking.
In letters dated July 19th, the first day of the FDA’s public LDT meeting, the Agency continued its crackdown on direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic test providers, mailing letters to 14 providers of genetic tests. A list of all 14 companies and tests appears below.
Personal Genomics Goes to Washington
Next week, the eyes of the personal genomics world will be focused on Washington, D.C., where the FDA and Congress will be meeting separately to consider the industry’s future. First, the FDA will convene a highly-anticipated public meeting (July 19th and 20th) to “discuss how the agency will oversee laboratory-developed tests (LDTs).” The FDA announced last month a proposal to develop a “risk-based” approach to oversight of all LDTs – a broad category that includes the vast majority of genetic tests, including high-complexity diagnostic tests (IVDMIAs) and direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic tests. Hot on the heels of the FDA meeting, on July 22nd, the House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce – which two months ago launched its own investigation into the personal genomics industry – will hold a subcommittee hearing on “Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Testing and the Consequences to the Public Health.”1
While the genomics and personalized medicine communities anxiously await the upcoming FDA and Congressional meetings, yesterday the future of personal genomics was being debated on the opposite coast, at a policy forum in San Francisco entitled “Genomics and the Consumer: The Present and Future of Personalized Medicine” (pdf). The forum, which was hosted by California State Senator Alex Padilla (sponsor of S.B. 482, the so-called “bioinformatics bill”) and personal genomics company 23andMe, was filled with speculation from personal genomics investors, providers, customers and commentators about what the FDA and Congress might have in store for the field.
Breaking: FDA Moves to Broadly Regulate LDTs
Earlier today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that it will hold a public meeting July 19-20 to “discuss how the agency will oversee laboratory-developed tests (LDTs).” The FDA has made several high-profile announcements over the past month – particularly in the area of direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic testing – but today’s development, despite its not receiving the same degree of media attention, is likely the most significant development to date.
Why? Until today, the FDA’s recent announcements have involved a series of letters to DTC genetic testing companies, beginning last month with Pathway Genomics and continuing last week with letters to five other prominent DTC companies. Despite all of the attention paid to these letters, the sum total of the FDA’s regulatory focus amounted to only a handful of products. Today’s announcement, on the other hand, declares the FDA’s intent to much more aggressively regulate the entire field of LDTs. While an exact count of the number of LDTs available is impossible, GeneTests.org lists more than 2,000 genetic tests from nearly 600 laboratories, numbers which do not even include genetic tests and other diagnostic products offered DTC. After having been criticized for a policy of case-by-case regulation, the FDA has answered with a move to regulate the entire field of laboratory-based testing.
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Evaluating the NIH’s New Genetic Testing Registry
This morning the NIH announced plans to create a publicly accessible registry of genetic tests. The Genetic Testing Registry (GTR) is expected to be available in 2011 and will contain information voluntarily submitted by genetic test providers. The news is significant and carries implications for clinical genetic testing laboratories, personal genomics service providers and individual purchasers of genetic tests.
Many details of the GTR are yet to come, with NIH promising to “engage stakeholders – such as genetic test developers, test kit manufacturers, health care providers, patients and researchers – for their insights on the best way to collect and display test information.” While the GTR isn’t expected to launch until next year, and there is time to fill in the details, the questions and answers section of the GTR’s new website helpfully addresses several of the most important features of the registry.
This post looks at what we know about the GTR today, and considers what the GTR’s ultimate implementation might mean for the development and regulation of genetic testing. (Note that the inset orange questions, and the text that immediately follows each question, is taken directly from the GTR question and answer page.)
