CIC microGUNE and Biodonostia test a new technique for evaluating intestinal diseases in patients

Nov 23 2011

The CIC microGUNE research centre and the Biodonostia Institute have recently started testing a new technique for assessing the severity of inflammatory intestinal diseases, such as Crohn's Disease, in patients at the Donostia Hospital.

This new technology, which has been developed jointly by the two centres, involves detection of the TNF-alpha protein, which is known to be a marker for numerous inflammatory diseases such as Crohn's Disease, rheumatoid arthritis and spondylitis.

The excellent results obtained to date could lead to CIC microGUNE and Biodonostia patenting this technology as it could be used to detect markers for other diseases by making a few modifications.

In contrast to current methods for diagnosing Crohn's Disease, such as endoscopy, the TNF-alpha detection technique developed by CIC microGUNE and Biodonostia is essentially non-invasive as it only requires a small amount of blood.

Subsequent development of this technique is expected to lead to deposition of the blood sample on a microdevice incorporated into a credit card-sized support. This support will then be introduced into a reader, which will provide the diagnosis in only a few minutes. Furthermore, it has the advantage of being able to determine the severity of the disease much more accurately.