Research by the WHO found that 2019 alone saw as many as 1.27 million deaths because of anti-microbial resistant infections. Credit: shutterstock / TopMicrobialStock.

South Korean diagnostic company QuantaMatrix has announced the development of what it is calling the world’s fastest all-in-one antimicrobial testing system able, to cut down the time needed to identify conditions such as sepsis.

Dubbed Ultra-Rapid Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing (uRAST), the test is backed by a study published in the journal Nature, which found the test bypasses the need for a blood culture to be processed, demonstrating a potential to reduce the turnaround time of reporting drug susceptibility profiles by more than 40h–60h compared with traditional methods of testing for antimicrobial susceptibility.

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Research by the World Health Organization (WHO) found that 2019 alone saw as many as 1.27 million deaths because of anti-microbial resistant infections, with that figure estimated to rise to more than ten million by 2050, outpacing cancer-related deaths.

Seoul-based QuantaMatrix claims that its uRAST test boasts a 94.9% accuracy rate, which is in line with other current methods of identifying infections but within significantly lower timeframes. The company also claims that the test excels at detecting small quantities of bacteria in the early stages of infection.

QuantaMatrix CEO Sunghoon Kwon said: “The Nature publication on uRAST highlights its potential to become the new standard in clinical microbiology. By drastically reducing testing times, we aim to lead the global market in both antimicrobial susceptibility and blood culture testing, which together represent a market value of approximately $20bn.”

The company also claims that when tested at Seoul National University Hospital, uRAST reduced the time from positive blood culture results to optimal antimicrobial prescription by an average of 13 hours. Compared to traditional hospital methods that typically take 48-72 hours, this time reduction includes both testing and waiting periods between different steps in the processes.

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The test now joins QuantaMatrix’s other anti-microbial tests on the market, including its Direct Rapid Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing System (dRAST) as the company plans to expand its place in the Korean, Middle Eastern and European markets, and looks to expand into Africa.

Elsewhere in the fight against anti-microbial resistant bacteria, Sweden-based university spinout Sysmex Astrego has won £8m ($10.2m) for its device for the treatment of urinary tract infections (UTI) using less than half a millilitre of urine. At the same time, US sexual health diagnostic company Visby Medical has been granted $1.8m to develop a portable rapid diagnostic for gonorrhoea that includes tests for antibiotic susceptibility.