LAKE SUCCESS, NY— The North Shore-LIJ Laboratories, part of the North Shore-LIJ Health System, announced today that it will join leading cancer institutes in offering the state-of-the-art CellSearch® system, used to count tumor cells in the bloodstream to more accurately predict survival for patients with metastatic breast, colorectal or prostate cancers.

Distributed by Veridex LLC, a Johnson & Johnson company, the CellSearch® Circulating Tumor Cell (CTC) Test separates and calculates the amount of cancer cells that have broken off of a tumor and are circulating in the blood. In conjunction with patient diagnostics and examination, the test results can indicate the progression of the disease. Continual monitoring of these cells has been shown to more accurately predict prognoses and help physicians and patients make more informed decisions about cancer care.

The high-tech test is currently being used at North Shore-LIJ Laboratories and available to cancer patients, assisting in the decision-making process about their care. “By offering this technology throughout our practice, North Shore-LIJ Laboratories is fundamentally changing the way we approach cancer care as we will use CTCs to help assess the prognosis of our patients,” said, James Crawford, MD, senior vice president of Laboratory Services and chair of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine for North Shore-LIJ.

Dr. Crawford explained that the high-tech system makes it possible to consistently find and separate a single CTC among approximately 40 billion blood cells. The test can be used at any time during the course of disease for serial monitoring of patients with metastatic breast, colorectal or prostate cancers. North Shore-LIJ is committed to investing in cutting-edge technologies like the CTC test, which has been honored for its innovation, development and application in the medical world and the future of biomedical science.

For more information about the North Shore-LIJ Laboratories and the Circulating Tumor Cell Test, call (800) 472-5757 or e-mail Labhelp@nshs.edu. The North Shore-LIJ Laboratories are located at 10 Nevada Drive, Lake Success, NY 11042.

Media Contact: Kristen Longo
516-465-2607/2600
klongo@nshs.edu