Date: December 13, 2012
Company: Johns Hopkins University
Contract amount: This is a cooperative agreement for approximately $4.4 million over a 3-year period
About the contract: Under this cooperative agreement, Johns Hopkins University through the School of Medicine will coordinate clinical research with influenza diagnostic testing in emergency departments at four strategically selected medical centers: the University of California, Los Angeles (Olive View-UCLA Medical Center, Sylmar, Calif.), the University of Arizona (Maricopa Integrated Health System, Phoenix, Ariz., the University of Missouri Kansas City (Truman Medical Center, Kansas City Mo.), and the Johns Hopkins University (Bayview Medical Center, Baltimore Md.) All four medical departments are part of the EMERGEncy ID Net, a multi-center emergency department research network.
Johns Hopkins will also collaborate with an industry partner, Cepheid, to consolidate and aggregate GeneXpert flu test results from each of the participating emergency department sites, and sharing these data with CDC, public health partners, as well as the participating institutions and clinicians.
The project will:
- Assess the performance of a rapid near-patient test (Cepheid’s GeneXpert Flu test – a PCR-based diagnostic device) and evaluate the impact of rapid influenza testing on clinician decisions with prescribing antivirals for ED patients.
- Develop, validate and implement an electronic clinical decision guide for presenting signs and symptoms, to assist clinicians with influenza testing decisions for ED patients at increased risk of influenza complications.
- Demonstrate the feasibility of an electronic data aggregation pilot utilizing a cloud-based interface to consolidate and structure influenza test results in real-time.
Findings from this research can provide evidence for clinicians, healthcare facilities and public health officials in making decisions about using appropriate rapid influenza testing in emergency departments. Having the ability to access structured data in real-time and use other electronic tools can help healthcare providers and public health officials in controlling the spread of flu a pandemic or seasonal outbreak.
