A Medical Device Daily

Quidel (San Diego) a provider of rapid point-of-care (POC) diagnostic tests, reported an exclusive partnership to provide Roche Pharma (Basel, Switzerland) with the QuickVue Influenza A+B rapid diagnostic test for its marketing and selling activities along with its Tamiflu (Oseltamivir) antiviral for the 2007 — 2008 influenza season in Germany.

The company said the agreement will increase the speed of the QuickVue rapid test to help characterize influenza infection (the flu) along with the Tamiflu treatment to improve patient recovery time.

The flu is a contagious respiratory illness caused by influenza viruses. It can cause mild to severe illness, and at times can lead to death. On average, anywhere between 10% to 20% of a given population in Germany will get the flu, resulting in ten to twenty thousand hospitalizations.

The QuickVue brand Influenza tests are designed to aid in the rapid diagnosis of influenza infection which can lead to earlier treatment. A new flu virus comes around every winter, infecting people of all ages and causing lost days from school and work. In the late fall and winter, flu outbreaks can begin suddenly, and can spread quickly through local communities.

Roche is a research-focused healthcare group in the fields of pharmaceuticals and diagnostics.

In other agreements news:

• Beckman Coulter (Fullerton, California), a manufacturer of diagnostics instruments in the U.S., reported it has been awarded a sole-source agreement with Alverno Clinical Laboratories (Hammond, Indiana) to provide a full range of hematology analyzers and supplies.

Alverno is an integrated laboratory services provider jointly sponsored by Sisters of St. Francis Health Services and Provena Health, with 18 hospitals and four laboratories in Illinois and Indiana.

Alverno is expected to purchase about $10 million over the life of the contract. This contract covers all locations, including some that were recently added to the group through mergers with Provena Health and the Sisters of St. Francis Health Services. These locations will replace existing systems with Beckman Coulter products to achieve standardization of testing platforms throughout the network.

Alverno offers integrated laboratory services provided jointly sponsored by Sisters of St. Francis Health Services (SSFHS; Kankakee Illinois) and Provena Health (Mokena, Illinois).

The companies believe that the integration will enable their laboratory organization to provide a higher quality of laboratory science and service and to compete better in the future. When operations are fully integrated, the network will serve 18 hospitals in Illinois and Indiana, and dozens of clinics and health centers, approaching a volume of 10 million tests annually.