Disease activity test helps with MS care decisions: Study
Blood-based biomarker assay measures proteins
Assessing multiple sclerosis (MS) disease activity using Octave Bioscience’s MS Disease Activity (MSDA) blood biomarker test can help guide clinicians’ decisions about care, a study showed.
“Our goal is to empower both providers and patients with precision tools that transform MS care,” Doug Biehn, CEO of Octave, said in a company press release. “We are encouraged to see how clinicians’ management plans change after reviewing the MSDA Test results, including how clinicians alter existing therapies, initiate new therapies or implement other interventions. The study clearly demonstrates that the MSDA Test is a precision tool that provides physicians with clinically actionable data, enabling more targeted treatment decisions and helping support disease stability in real time.”
The study, “Real-world clinical utility of a multi-protein, blood-based biomarker assay for disease activity assessments in multiple sclerosis,” was published in Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical. The work was funded by Octave.
Managing MS is complex and often requires adjustments in care over time. The MSDA test measures the levels of 18 proteins in the blood to track disease activity, with the aim of helping clinicians make more informed decisions.
“One of the biggest challenges in MS management is determining when to adjust treatment,” said Taylor Gonyou, lead investigator of the study and a neurologist at the Michigan Institute for Neurological Disorders. “This study demonstrates that integrating multi-analyte biomarker data from the Octave MSDA Test into clinical workflows enhances decision-making, particularly with repeated use, as confidence in the MSDA Test grows over time.”
Test prompts doctors to change treatment decisions
The researchers wanted to see how the MSDA test affects clinicians’ decision-making in routine clinical practice. For the study, 20 clinicians from 14 clinics reviewed the medical charts of 352 MS patients who underwent the MSDA test, noting times when the test helped them make decisions about changes in care.
“Understanding the real-world clinical utility of a disease-specific, biology-based test like MSDA, in a complex disease such as MS, is a necessary step for ushering precision medicine into routine neurological practice,” the scientists wrote. “Thus, to determine the value and impact of the MSDA on clinician decision-making as an adjunct to the clinical exam and MRI findings, the present study examined whether and how clinicians’ management plans change after reviewing MSDA results.”
Comparing decisions from before and after MSDA results were available, the researchers found the test led to changes in clinical decisions, such as deciding to start a new treatment or continue an old one, in 19.4% of cases. This rate is notably higher than would be expected with standard-of-care assessments, including MRI scans, the researchers noted.
More than half (59.8%) of the clinicians said they agreed or strongly agreed that a single MSDA test result helped with their decision making. In cases where multiple MSDA test results were available over time, nearly 70% of clinicians agreed that the test was helpful in informing their decisions.
“Based on the clinicians’ assessment of the impact of the MSDA on their decision-making, the MSDA had a meaningful impact on MS management at decision time points, particularly after multiple, longitudinal MSDA tests are available,” the researchers wrote, adding that these data “demonstrate the impact of MSDA on clinician decision-making in MS and provide evidence for the clinical utility of MSDA, particularly when used longitudinally approximately every 6 months.”
The researchers noted that the study was limited to clinicians who were already using the MSDA test as part of routine care, which “may limit generalizability of the results,” and that the fact that the way the test was implemented might have varied between clinicians and sites.
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