Getlabs Continues In-Home Phlebotomy Services Advance

Unlike many other healthcare providers, medical labs can’t ply their trade purely via telehealth. Human contact is necessary at some point. After all, testing must be performed on actual, physical samples. Collection and delivery of samples becomes trickier when tests are ordered via telehealth. Patients who can’t or won’t leave home for a medical consultation also want to be able to provide the samples necessary to perform the tests their telehealth provider orders for them without going to a clinic or collection center. This situation has created the need for a new kind of service: in-home phlebotomy.

Getlabs Takes the In-Home Phlebotomy Market by Storm

Among the up-and-comers in this space is Getlabs, a Miami, Florida-based startup that has assembled a nationwide network of roving phlebotomists that will come to a patient’s home or office to collect samples for a “convenience fee” starting at $35. Although it has only existed since 2018, Getlabs has secured major in-home phlebotomy services contracts from some of the nation’s biggest lab companies, including Labcorp, Quest Diagnostics, and Sonora Quest.

The company now operates in 25 states and the District of Columbia and plans to expand both its geographic and services offering footprints. Last February, it bolstered its expansion designs by raising $20 million in Series A funding. Its investors include Labcorp, Byers Capital, 23andMe co-founder Anne Wojcicki and her sister Susan, who happens to serve as CEO of YouTube.

The Getlabs/JumpstartMD Alliance

Getlabs has made another dynamic move by teaming with weight management firm JumpstartMD. The collaboration with JumpstartMD, which was announced on Sept. 27, enables Getlabs to apply its business model to a different kind of venture. JumpstartMD isn’t a lab network but a weight management program that deploys Stanford-trained physicians and other medical professionals to provide personalized and clinically-based weight loss solutions, as well as nutritional, hormone replacement, and vitamin therapy services. Teaming up with Getlabs enables JumpstartMD to order on-demand blood draws as part of their at-home health monitoring program.

Under the partnership, Getlabs mobile labs will collect samples from JumpstartMD members and send them to local labs for testing. Those labs will then report the results to the member’s ordering healthcare provider. JumpstartMD providers will then use those results to create or track the test subject’s individualized health program. JumpstartMD providers can also prescribe FDA-approved medications to supplement and support the program.

"Medical evaluations and ongoing monitoring are critical for maintaining care plans and driving positive patient outcomes," noted Getlabs founder and chief executive officer Kyle Michelson in a press release. "By empowering JumpstartMD members with convenient at-home blood draw services, we can help increase program adherence."

The In-Home Phlebotomy Market

Lockdowns and the vast expansion of telehealth have driven explosive growth in the global mobile phlebotomy services market, which financial consultant Emergen Research valued at $497.3 million in 2020. Emergen also predicts a revenue compound annual growth rate of 4.4 percent through 2028, driven by growing demand for routine blood testing. The cancer segment is expected to grow the fastest and account for the highest market share due to high worldwide cancer rates and rising demand for mobile phlebotomy services for blood-based tests to detect non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), solid tumor, and hematologic cancers via liquid biopsy. In addition to Getlabs, major players in the in-home phlebotomy market include NeoGenomics Laboratories, Viracor-IBT Laboratories, Angel's on Wheels Mobile Phlebotomy LLC, Sonora Quest Laboratories, TravaLab LLC, Ultimate Wellness Providers Co., Mobile Phlebotomy Services, Inc., Pinnacle Mobile Phlebotomy, LLC, VeniExpress, Inc., and Progressive Phlebotomy Services, LLC.

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Here’s a summary of key strategic diagnostic deals announced in October 2022:

Strategic Alliances, Partnerships, & Collaborations

Partner 1	Partner(s) 2+	Deal Summary
Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard	Dana-Farber Cancer Institute + St. Jude Children's Research Hospital	• Objective: Develop more effective pediatric cancer treatments • Dynamic: Invest $60 million to fund 5-year Pediatric Cancer Dependencies Accelerator project to improve understanding of pediatric cancers and identify novel treatment targets • Develop genome editing techniques to identify vulnerabilities across high-risk pediatric brain, blood, and solid tumor cancers
Illumina	AstraZeneca	• Objective: Discover novel drug targets • Dynamic: Research collaboration to use AI-based genome interpretation and analysis to evaluate whether a combined framework can strengthen target discovery • AstraZeneca's Center for Genomics Research to use combined framework to analyze large, multiomic datasets in its digital biobank
Illumina	GenoScreen	• Objective: Advance genomic testing for multidrug-resistant tuberculosis with GenoScreen's Deeplex Myc-TB sequencing assay detecting TB and other bacteria to predict resistance to 15 antibiotics
NanoString Technologies	Visiopharm	• Objective: Develop integrated workflows for new biomarker and drug target discovery using spatial imaging and machine-learning • Dynamic: NanoString to synergize the GeoMx Digital Spatial Profiler workflows with Visiopharm’s Oncotopix Discovery AI-driven image analysis software
Intermountain Forensics	Astrea Forensics	• Objective: Validate and implement Astrea's single-reaction single-stranded DNA library preparation (SRSLY—pronounced “seriously”) technology) • Dynamic: SRSLY assay that was originally developed for ancient DNA research to be applied to resolve and close cold cases
Adaptive Biotechnologies	Epic Systems	• Objective: Integrate Adaptive’s clonoSEQ assay into Epic’s electronic medical record (EMR) system • Dynamic: Integration, which is set to go live in 2023, will allow Epic system users to order clonoSEQ, for monitoring minimal residual disease (MRD), from Adaptive and review results as they would tests directly carried out at site of care
Getlabs	JumpstartMD	• Objective: Bring Getlabs’ at-home blood draw services to JumpstartMD patients • Dynamic: JumpstartMD recommendations to be tracked via Getlabs' in-home phlebotomy service • Samples collected by Getlabs mobile labs to be sent to local labs, with results reported to providers who order testing
Tempus	Kartos Therapeutics	• Objective: Develop companion diagnostic test for Kartos' drug navtemadlin for Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) • Dynamic: Test to be developed on Tempus' xT platform for use in identifying patients with TP53 wild-type MCC who may be eligible for treatment with navtemadlin
Personalis	Duke University + Olink Proteomics	• Objective: Discover biomarkers to guide immunotherapy in gastroesophageal cancer • Dynamic: Research collaboration to study the genomic, transcriptomic, and proteomic responses of gastroesophageal tumors after treatment with Merck's checkpoint inhibitor Keytruda (pembrolizumab) and compare the molecular profiles of responders and non-responders
ARTIDIS AG	University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center	• Objective: Investigate ARTIDIS technology as novel treatment-optimization tool for patients with solid tumors in several distinct indications • Dynamic: Researchers from MD Anderson and ARTIDIS researchers to use the ARTIDISNET platform to evaluate the combination of nanoscale physical properties of the tumor and corresponding clinical data to help identify biomarker signatures that suggest optimal therapeutic approaches
Horizon Discovery (owned by PerkinElmer)	Medical Device Innovation Consortium	• Objective: Develop somatic reference samples to advance and expand access to NGS-based cancer tests and boost awareness of celiac disease • Dynamic: Horizon to use CRISPR-based technologies to engineer 10 somatic reference samples for 10 different gene variants associated with certain types of cancer • Samples to undergo characterization and validation in a collaboration with the National Institute for Standards and Technology and likely become commercially available from Horizon by early 2024
Quest Diagnostics	Decode Health	• Objective: Discover biomarkers for metabolic disease and autoimmune neurology • Dynamic: Expansion of current collaboration for developing RNA sequencing capabilities culminating in creation of national platform for collecting and storing de-identified consented specimens from participants in pharma and academic studies
Telesis Bio (formerly called Codex DNA)	Cellibre	• Objective: Develop and validate instrument for on-demand CRISPR-Cas9 guide RNA (gRNA) synthesis • Dynamic: Cellibre to use its in-house technologies and cell lines to evaluate and validate the system for automated gRNA synthesis, and improve its own cell engineering workflows
Takara Bio USA	BioExcel Diagnostics	• Objective: Develop qPCR multiplex syndromic infectious disease diagnostic panel • Dynamic: Panels will use qPCR automation technology and reagents from Takara Bio USA to detect viruses, bacteria, fungi, and antimicrobial resistance genes

Distribution, Sales, & Marketing Agreements

Product Owner	Distributor	Deal Summary
Lucence	Omnigen Medical Products	• Products: Lucence’s LiquidHallmark NGS assay • Territory: Turkey
Angle	Promedeus	• Products: Angle’s Parsortix PC1 cell sorting system • Territory: Czech Republic • Exclusive for Greece and Cyprus; non-exclusive for rest of Europe
DNA Script	Gulf Scientific	• Products: DNA Script’s Enzymatic DNA synthesis platform • Territory: Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, UAE
DNA Script	Eisenberg Bros.	• Products: DNA Script’s Enzymatic DNA synthesis platform • Territory: Israel
Self-screen	Fujirebio Europe	• Products: Self-screen's PreCursor-M+ cervical cancer assay • Territory: Undisclosed
Sense Biodetection	Abacus Dx	• Products: Sense's Veros COVID-19 test • Territory: Australia and New Zealand • Nonexclusive
Aspira Women's Health	BioReference Laboratories (subsidiary of Opko Health)	• Products: Aspira’s Ova1Plus ovarian cancer test • Territory: US

Licenses

Licensor	Licensee	Deal Summary
Massachusetts General Hospital + Harvard Medical School	NanoMosaic	NanoMosaic gets exclusive rights to serum biomarker test for post-operative delirium for use in diagnosis and prognosis of patients with anesthesia-induced delirium and Alzheimer's disease on company’s nanoneedle-based Tessie system
Bioinfra Life Sciences	20/20 GeneSystems	20/20 gets exclusive license agreement to sell Bioinfra's technology for early detection of multiple cancers in US

Government Contracts

Contractor	Govt. Agency	Contract Summary
Biodesix	Veterans Health Administration and Military Health System	US Federal Supply Schedule contract to provide lung cancer testing using Biodesix’s Nodify XL2, Nodify CDT, VeriStrat, GeneStrat ddPCR, and GeneStrat NGS tests