The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently approved a blood test that may revolutionize the diagnosis of [traumatic brain injury]. It’s called the Brain Trauma Indicator and is marketed by Banyan Biomarkers Inc.
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The Brain Trauma Indicator blood test measures the levels of two proteins, UCH-L1 and GFAP. Upon brain injury, these proteins are released from the brain into the blood. If found at elevated levels, brain damage with intracranial lesions, normally otherwise only visible on a CT scan, is suggested.
The blood test can be done immediately, with results coming back in a few hours, allowing for health care professionals to send those patients who are blood test positive to the CT scan to confirm and gather more information on the damage.
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To give approval, FDA used data from a clinical study of 1,947 individual blood samples from adults with suspected TBI and compared blood test results with CT scan results. How did the blood test perform? It was able to predict the presence of intracranial lesions on a CT scan 97.5 percent of the time and those who did not have intracranial lesions on a CT scan 99.6 percent of the time.
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This test was developed in collaboration with the US Department of Defense and will be incredibly useful both for civilians in the United States and for the military overseas.
Read full, original post: A Blood Test For Brain Injury Approved By FDA
