Rapid and Cheap Diagnostic test for Haemophilia A developed

Indian Council of Medical Research’s (ICMR) National Institute of Immunohaematology (in Mumbai) has developed a cost-effective Point-of-Care (POC) rapid diagnostic test for severe genetic disorders Haemophilia A (also called factor VIII (FVIII)) and Von Willebrand Disease (VWD).

Key Features of POC Diagnostic Test

• Earlier Concern: Lack of diagnostic facilities and awareness as well as high costs of tests is leading to under diagnosis of bleeding disorders.
• Diagnosis of: The newly developed POC test kit can be used for diagnosis of undiagnosed patients, post-partum haemorrhage (PPH), menorrhagia cases, recovery of factors in the transfused Haemophilia A patients, gynaecological complications with bleeding history, and also for differential diagnosis of both diseases.
• Cost Effective: As per ICMR working cost of these kits is less than ₹50 which is too much less in comparison to existing conventional tests available for the diseases that costs around ₹4,000 to ₹10,000.
• Rapid: With help of POC test, diagnosis can be done within half an hour (30 minutes) of blood sample collection.
• Importance: This is World’s first Point-of-Care (POC) test for specific diagnosis of any common bleeding disorder.
• Fatal Disease: Patients with severe Haemophilia A or Von Willebrand Disease (VWD) can have severe life threatening spontaneous or post-traumatic bleeding such as gastrointestinal bleed and brain haemorrhage or they may also have bleeding into joints or superficial bleeding from gums or nose.

About Von Willebrand Disease (VWD)

• It is a genetic disorder caused by missing or defective Von Willebrand factor (VWF). VWF is a clotting protein.
• In normal case when a blood vessel is injured and bleeding occurs, VWF helps platelets to mesh together and form a clot to stop bleeding. But in case of people with VWD, they do not have enough VWF, or it does not work effectively (the way it would in normal case), thus it takes longer time for blood clotting and to stop bleeding.
• As per estimations up to 1% of world’s population suffers from VWD.

Month: Current Affairs - May, 2019