Verinata Health Inc, a privately-held company dedicated to maternal and fetal health, announced the peer-reviewed publication of a new health economic model for its verifi™ prenatal test that clearly demonstrates the clinical and economic value of integrating the verifi prenatal test into current prenatal screening algorithms. The model shows a dramatic reduction in both the number and cost of invasive procedures and associated miscarriages. This is the largest and most comprehensive health economic model to date evaluating the clinical and cost impact of incorporating a noninvasive prenatal test into routine clinical practice for high-risk pregnancies.

The model demonstrates, for a theoretical population of 100,000 pregnancies in five million covered lives, that incorporating the verifi test as a secondary prenatal screening test for high-risk pregnancies can be accomplished without an increase in the overall cost of care. The model also illustrates that clinical benefit is realized through the significant reduction in false positive results. Specifically, to correctly diagnose one aneuploidy, incorporating the verifi test into clinical practice for high-risk pregnancies would decrease the number of invasive diagnostic procedures by 81%, corresponding to a 71% reduction of costs associated with these procedures. Additionally, the model shows that unintended miscarriages due to invasive testing would be reduced from 60 with standard of care to 20 using the verifi test, a 66% reduction.

The publication, authored by Dr. Susan S. Garfield and Shannon Armstrong of Bridgehead International, is now available in the April edition of The Journal of Managed Care Medicine.

Source: Verinata Health Inc