A Spot of bother.

The October November 2010 edition of Intelligent Investor ran a piece on CST titled Cellestis passes the biotech test and someone recently commented that it contained a few factual errors, which rang more than just a few bells with me. For instance, take the issue of competition from T-Spot.TB which Intelligent Investor regard as a real threat. Recently the T-Spot people took great delight in proclaiming that in the US they now have their very own CPT code, which presumably would mean that there is now greater incentive to use their product. They mention that the reimbursement is a Category I code, 86481 but neglect to say how much that reimbursement is. A quick Google reveals that

New CPT code 86481 is priced at the same rate as CPT code 86480

and as we have been told CPT code 86480 is for QuantiFERON Gold and is for the amount of $69.27

So how much is a T-Spot test worth? It does take some digging around so lets look at this publication where Dr. Peter Wrighton-Smith, CEO of Oxford Immunotec says

As no reimbursement amount has yet been established in Switzerland for the TSPOT. TB test, a figure of CHF200 (EU129) was taken as an initial sum taken to estimate the costs of the test, associated consumables and labour required to perform the test both in the laboratory and the physician's office.

At today's exchange rate 129 euros is US$176.37 which would leave a shortfall of exactly $87.10. If these figures are correct then presumably either the provider or the customer will have to pick up the tab and therefore I just can't see any economic incentive to choose T-Spot.TB over QuantiFERON.