Anti-cancer device gains access to 56,000 health facilities

April 29th, 2009, 10:00 am · Post a Comment · posted by Jan Norman, small-business columnist

Irvine-based NeoMatrix LLC is now able to get its Halo breast cancer risk assessment device into thousands of hospitals, clinics and doctors’ offices. It has signed a three-year agreement with Premier Purchasing Partners LP, the nation’s largest healthcare purchasing alliance.

The FDA-approved Halo is to breast cancer detection what the Pap smear is to cervical cancer testing. Halo can detect abnormal cells years before a larger, potentially cancerous lesion develops, the company says.

It is designed for use in doctors’ offices because it is automated, noninvasive and takes five minutes.

Premier will offer special pricing and terms for Halo to its members, more than 2,100 hospitals and 54,000 other healthcare facilities. That agreement should make Halo much more widely available in the future, according to NeoMatrix CEO John Stroh.

Halo is currently available in about 200 locations including a dozen in Orange and Los Angeles counties, company spokesman Jay Geer said.

The agreement, terms of which weren’t released, could mean millions of dollars in revenue to NeoMatrix.

Stroh said the deal is a milestone for several reasons. “This is a new market category for Premier and a pivotal mark for NeoMatrix’s market expansion. Our team will work within the Premier alliance to market our device (to) ob/gyns, surgeons, breast centers, imaging centers, cancer/oncology groups and many others who can benefit from our advanced risk assessment technology.”

Most women think mammograms are the best early detection tool, but the mortality rate for breast cancer has declined only modestly since that test’s widespread adoption, Stroh said.

NeoMatrix recently received $17.2 million in venture capital funding.

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