Contract Awarded to Oxford Diagnostic Laboratories for T-SPOT TB Testing

Oxford Immunotec, Inc. announces that the National Acquisition Center of the Department of Veterans Affairs has awarded a Federal Supply Schedule contract  to Oxford Diagnostic Laboratories for T-SPOT.TB testing. This contract will be effective from Nov. 1, 2011 through Oct. 31, 2016.

Oxford Diagnostic Laboratories, a division of Oxford Immunotec, Inc., is the only national TB testing service exclusively dedicated to the T-SPOT.TB test. The laboratory, which is located in Marlborough, Mass., provides TB testing services to hundreds of physicians and healthcare institutions throughout the US.

The T-SPOT.TB test is a blood test, also known as an Interferon Gamma Release Assay (IGRA), used to test for tuberculosis (TB) infection. The introduction of IGRAs provides healthcare institutions with a key tool in eradicating TB in the United States. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends that IGRAs can be used in all situations where the tuberculin skin test (TST) is currently used.

The T-SPOT.TB test received premarket approval from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in July 2008. The test is backed by the clinical evidence of over 200 peer-reviewed publications, and is the only TB screening test with sensitivity and specificity exceeding 95 percent in FDA pivotal trials. The T-SPOT.TB test has become widely utilized in hundreds of hospitals, medical practices and public health facilities throughout the United States.

Government facilities depend on simple, accurate screening for their healthcare workers, patients and military personnel for this important transmissible disease. IGRAs, such as the T-SPOT.TB test, address the well-documented limitations of the TST, such as false positive test results, failure of individuals to return for the reading of the test result and poor reliability in individuals with weakened immune systems. The awarding of this contract ensures that all government facilities will now have immediate access to a more accurate and reliable test.

Commenting on the contract award, Dr. Peter Wrighton-Smith, CEO of Oxford Immunotec, says, The awarding of this contract to Oxford Diagnostic Laboratories for T-SPOT.TB testing services will provide easy access to the T-SPOT.TB test to all government facilities. I am pleased that the National Acquisition Center believes that it is important that their entities have access to the T-SPOT.TB test.