Nine New Studies Demonstrate Utility and Long-Term Durability of Afirma GEC (Gene Expression Classifier)

 

At the 85th Annual Meeting of the American Thyroid Association, nine new studies were presented on over 700 patients with Afirma GEC test results demonstrating reduction in unnecessary surgeries.

 

These studies included patient outcomes reported by

  • Duke University Medical Center
  • Tulane University School of Medicine
  • University of Kansas School of Medicine
  • Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
  • Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons
  • Wellspan Endocrinology
  • Mercy Medical Center and Iowa Diabetes and Endocrinology Center
  • A multicenter study of 16 community practice sites led by researchers at Ohio State University and Duke University

Anthem Study: One of the studies evaluating BlueCross BlueShield patients nationwide showed no difference in thyroid surgery rates between patients with benign Afirma GEC results compared to patients with benign cytopathology results after 20 months of follow up.

Methods: Researchers from Veracyte and Anthem, Inc. compared outcomes during follow-up of 201 patients with benign Afirma GEC results to a matched control group of 603 patients with benign cytopathology-only results.

Findings: Over an average follow-up period of 20 months, patients with benign Afirma GEC results were no more likely to undergo thyroid surgery than the control group (11% vs. 10% – See Figure 1). The rate of ultrasound follow-up examinations was also similar among the patients with benign Afirma GEC results (60%), compared to the cytopathology-benign group (62%).

Conclusions: In this national BlueCross BlueShield patient population the benign Afirma GEC diagnosis is durable with rates of thyroid surgery and ultrasound follow-up equivalent to that of a cytopathology benign diagnosis. These observed surgical and ultrasound follow-up patterns suggest very similar management protocols of benign Afirma GEC and cytopathology benign patients.

The full abstract book of the 85th ATA meeting can be found at this link.