Is there any reason to believe that submitting another sample to you would provide any additional information or possible changes in treatment protocols now that we are almost 4 months into the treatment plan?

Is there any reason to believe that submitting another sample to you would provide any additional information or possible changes in treatment protocols now that we are almost 4 months into the treatment plan? Do you suggest additional test sampling as time goes on? Would it provide us with any additional information?

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Our Answer:

We would suggest you submit another FNA and blood samples to us WHEN the patient's lymphoma relapses. Relapse of lymphoma means that the cancer develops a resistance to certain chemo drugs in use. When this happens, the relapsed cancer cells are usually different from the ones investigated in the naive status, which led to different drug response predictions to the tested drugs. Therefore, it would be better to get new tumor samples and find out what are the new preferred drugs and which of the used drugs still remain effective or became resistant for the relapsed lymphoma. However, the best scenario is to maintain clinical remission for as long a period of time so that you don’t have to order another service from us! If a second service is needed, we offer a 50% discount for returning patients.

For the blood tube submission– Do you request that on every patient, even if they don't have a leukemic component? And what type of blood tube do you request we send the sample in?

We require at least 2 mL of whole blood in an EDTA-treated tube.

What type of sample is needed – just aspirates and a typical flow sample?

We need about 10 million cancer cells to run the full chemosensitivity panel so we ask that you conduct an aggressive woodpecker style FNA, poking as many nodes as possible and putting the cells into our proprietary media tubes (ensures we receive live cells), then of course we need a whole blood sample (2mL).

Is this test available outside the US? Could I order the test?

Because we require live, fresh, cancer cells within 24-48 hours of doing a fine needle aspiration, we are ONLY offering our services in North America at this time. If you already had an experience of sending biopsy samples to the US in 24-48 hours, we could discuss the work further. Please contact info@imprimedicine.com.

When will I be billed? Are we billed at the same time as placing the order?

Invoices will be sent about 30 days after the service is ordered. We send the invoice to the email (billing or accounts payable) we have on file for the clinic at the start of the month for any services provided the month prior.

Can the blood sample be frozen or refrigerated before shipping?