POC testing, new monitoring strategies on fast growth paths in European healthcare arenas.(point-of-care)

POC testing, new monitoring strategies on fast growth paths in European healthcare arenas

By MICHAEL SIMONSEN, PhD

BB&T Contributing Editor

DÜSSELDORF, Germany — The worldwide markets for products used in point-of-care (POC) testing and for monitoring of vital signs in patients outside the traditional hospital setting have been growing at rates in excess of those for the overall medical device and diagnostics market. Among the segments of the market exhibiting the most rapid growth are products for whole blood glucose testing, POC coagulation testing products, POC cardiac markers, and patient monitoring products used for home and ambulatory monitoring.

The European market is no exception, although POC testing and remote patient monitoring have advanced less rapidly in Europe than in the U.S. The 2006 MEDICA exhibition, held here in mid-November, provided an opportunity to view the latest developments in POC testing and patient monitoring, as well as advances in many other segments of the medical device market, including diagnostic imaging, surgical navigation, endoscopy, drug delivery and electrostimulation therapy.

Although held in Europe, the MEDICA exhibition attracts vendors from all the major world markets, including suppliers from emerging markets such as China, India, and Latin America, which represent some of the most rapidly growing segments of the global market. In addition, suppliers from emerging markets are having an impact on markets in the developed regions by offering products with competitive features at low prices. Chinese companies in particular are beginning to expand outside of their domestic market to target penetration of the European and U.S. markets, with product offerings that in some cases offer features equivalent to those provided by established suppliers.

POC testing expanding in Europe

The market for in vitro diagnostic POC testing products in Europe is one segment that is attracting growing interest among suppliers, from both from developed as well as emerging countries. As shown in Table 1, the total market for POC testing products in Europe is estimated at more than $3.3 billion for 2005, and the market is forecast to more than double by 2011, approaching $6.9 billion.

Products for home and self-testing, primarily whole blood glucose monitoring products, are expected to exhibit the most rapid growth, followed by hospital POC testing products and physician's office laboratory products. Other important products within the home and self-testing segment include coagulation self-testing products, as well as home pregnancy and fertility test kits.

Testing whole blood glucose

The market for whole blood glucose testing products, estimated at almost $2.9 billion in Europe in 2006, is being driven by continued increases in diabetes prevalence worldwide as well as by growing appreciation of the benefits of improved management of blood glucose levels on long-term outcome. Tight glucose control (TGC) programs in hospitals are an important factor, with some suppliers of hospital bedside whole blood glucose testing systems reporting that 78% of the hospitals in their U.S. customer base have adopted TGC protocols, and estimating that similar trends are prevailing in Europe.

A new concept for whole blood glucose self-testing was introduced at the MEDICA exhibition by GlucoTel Scientific (Reno, Nevada/Lichtenfels, Germany). GlucoTel is the medical division of the IT security company Safe-com GmbH & Co. (also Lichtefels), and in addition to glucose monitoring technology is also focused on telemedical applications for monitoring of blood pressure, body weight, and other parameters.

The company has developed a new glucose meter that communicates via Bluetooth to any enabled cell phone, as well as Java-based software that runs on the phone and provides a wireless link to the Internet and thence to a disease management website running on a dedicated server.

The system provides automatic archiving of glucose readings as well as of patient-entered data on exercise level, food intake, drug dosage, and other factors relevant to diabetes management such as intake of nutritional supplements. The web site provides a graphic representation of the archived data, and allows review via the Internet by the patient and his or her doctor or …