Recent changes in the clinical and economic environment for rubidium PET were evident in the Society of Nuclear Medicine (SNM) booth of Bracco Diagnostics, which has seen a resurgence of interest in its CardioGen rubidium tracer.
Medicare reimbursement for rubidium-based PET studies got a big boost earlier this year from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), which tripled its payment for the study. Recent clinical papers have also favorably compared rubidium-based cardiac PET to the workhorse nuclear cardiology modality, technetium-based SPECT.
Bracco of Princeton, NJ, sees physician education as being a major issue in growing rubidium usage, and has formed a new Clinical Operations Group to educate users on optimizing their equipment and using the correct protocols.
Bracco also used the SNM show in San Diego to discuss Choletech and Kinevac, gallbladder agents that saw a disruption in supply in 2001 after Bristol-Myers Squibb of North Billerica, MA, stopped manufacturing the products, which Bracco distributed. Since then, Bracco has taken over manufacturing of both products.
Bracco has worked to improve Kinevac's formulation and in 2005 got U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval to market the product for its intended application (Kinevac had previously been used off-label to force the gallbladder to contract during nuclear imaging to determine ejection fractions). Bracco has also secured separate insurance reimbursement codes for using Kinevac, which had not been in place during the product's previous incarnation.
Educational materials are being assembled for Kinevac with the goal of a product relaunch at the end of 2006 or early 2007, according to the company.
By AuntMinnie.com staff writers
June 7, 2006
Related Reading
Bracco opens perfusion PET company, June 1, 2006
Bracco inks Amerinet deal, January 26, 2006
Bracco to sell Esaote, January 23, 2006
Bracco, Toshiba partner in 64-slice CTA trial, July 13, 2005
FDA OKs expanded use for Kinevac, June 1, 2005
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