News, Analysis, Trends, Management Innovations for
Clinical Laboratories and Pathology Groups

Hosted by Robert Michel

News, Analysis, Trends, Management Innovations for
Clinical Laboratories and Pathology Groups

Hosted by Robert Michel
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Illumina Is Using Acquisitions to Challenge Roche in Fast-growing Market for Gene-based Clinical Pathology Laboratory Testing

Hot competition for genetic testing market share is a signal to medical laboratories to ramp up their molecular and genetic testing capabilities

Financial analysts see something of an “old west” style shootout on the horizon for genetic testing in the clinical laboratory testing market. Market leaders in next-generation gene sequencing are prepared to use acquisitions to build dominant shares in a gene testing market that experts say could hit $25 billion by 2022.

Reporters at Bloomberg Businessweek believe that San Diego-based Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ: ILMN) is girding up to take on industry giant Roche Holding AG (ROG.VX). Both Illumina and Life Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ:LIFE) are buying up smaller players in the gene testing market.

These two market leaders in DNA sequencing equipment have played important roles in revolutionizing genetic testing. Now, they intend to stake out a share of the fast-growing genetic diagnostics market themselves, a recent Businessweek story reported. (more…)

WellPoint’s New Pay-for-Performance Program to Pay Hospitals More for Meeting Quality Measures

Private payers taking first steps on a path toward value-based purchasing that could eventually include clinical pathology laboratory testing services

Pay-for-performance just took a leap forward with news that one of the nation’s largest health insurers will link hospital reimbursement to specific quality measures. This development could be a precursor to similar payer initiatives that involve how private payers reimburse clinical laboratories and anatomic pathology groups.

Indianapolis-based WellPoint, Inc. (NYSE: WLP) will revamp the way it reimburses about 1,500 hospitals across the country. In a news story published by Bloomberg Businessweek, Rick Wartzman, Executive Director of the Drucker Institute at Claremont Graduate University, explained that, going forward, WellPoint wants to base annual payment increases to hospitals using a formula that incorporates the health insurer’s quality criteria, rather than to the quantity of services delivered.
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