AdvanDx announced that Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center has implemented AdvanDx’s PNA FISH™ rapid tests to identify bloodstream pathogens in hours instead of days to help physicians, pharmacists and nurses improve care and outcomes for patients with bloodstream infections.

Every year, 350,000 patients contract bloodstream infections in the United States causing over 90,000 deaths and significant costs to the healthcare system.  Rapid and accurate identification of the causative pathogen is crucial to ensuring appropriate antibiotic therapy and improving patient outcomes. Conventional diagnostic methods can take 48 hours or longer forcing physicians to treat patients empirically with broad-spectrum antibiotics that may prove to be ineffective and can lead to long-term resistance.  AdvanDx’s PNA FISH tests use the bacterial pathogens’ own genetic material to provide identification results 48 to 72 hours sooner than conventional methods.1  Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center has implemented AdvanDx’s PNA FISH tests to accelerate the delivery of therapy-directing diagnostic results, enabling clinicians to administer appropriate therapy earlier and improve outcomes for patients afflicted with bloodstream infections.

“We are delighted that Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center has implemented PNA FISH,” said Thais T. Johansen, President and CEO of AdvanDx.  “They join a growing list of innovative hospitals in the New England area and around the country that use rapid, molecular testing to provide better care and improve outcomes for patients with these terrible infections,” Johansen added.