New Test Identifies Patients at Risk of Severe COVID-19

U.S. scientists have developed a new genomic test that can predict a patient’s risk of developing severe COVID-19, an advance that could help doctors quickly begin tailored treatment. The test proved more than 90 percent accurate at predicting patient outcomes for COVID-19 among more than two dozen patients in intensive care and 100 patients from publicly available data.

AMPEL Biosolutions’ CovGENE analyzes genes expressed in a person’s blood to determine whether they may experience a severe disease course with increased risk of death. “We have come far in the prevention and treatment of COVID-19 in the past two years,” said Alexandra Kadl, MD, at the University of Virginia. “Regardless, we still struggle to identify patients at highest risk for severe disease. Our study uses a gene-analysis approach to identify an immune cell signature, distinct from other respiratory illnesses, that correlates with worse outcomes.”

The test has the potential to help evaluate patients’ immune profile with commonly, readily available tests to identify patients at risk for bad outcomes who would benefit from closer monitoring and advanced therapies to aid their recovery. Immune profiling helps to understand why one person may differ from another in their immune response to a virus, looking specifically at the immune markers (proteins) and cells present over time.