CONX.OB Article on AspirinWorks:
AspirinWorks offers simplified test
BY KAREN SHIDELER
The Wichita Eagle
Fri, Apr. 17, 2009
The inspiration came to Gordon Ens during a speech a dozen or so years ago.
It was 9 p.m. on a Tuesday, he remembers. The speaker, a cardiologist, said, "The day is coming when we're going to have to dose aspirin."
Ens turned to his colleague. "Well," Ens said, "if you're going to dose something, you have to have a test."
Today, that test exists as AspirinWorks, and it measures the level of a chemical called thromboxane. It differs from similar tests in that it measures the level in urine rather than blood and isn't a time-dependent test.
Ens, a native Kansan who works from his Andover home, is clinical affairs director for AspirinWorks.
He got there by way of Denver, where he founded Colorado Coagulation Consultants in the early 1970s. It was a small medical lab that specialized in clotting.
"My friends all thought I was crazy," he said. But over the years, as the realization grew in the medical world that chemotherapy, surgery, even broken bones had an effect on blood clots, Ens' lab grew.
In the late '90s, about the same time he was listening to that cardiologist talk about aspirin dosing, Ens sold his lab to Esoterix Coagulation, which decided not long after that it no longer needed Ens' services.
"Everything happens for a reason," Ens said. "That's really what gave me the opportunity" to form Creative Clinical Concepts in 2002. It's the company that teamed with Corgenix to bring AspirinWorks to market.
"I didn't come up with the test," Ens said. "What I did was, I found a test" less complex than earlier ones.
Many people take aspirin to stave off heart attacks. The problem, Ens said, is that studies have shown not all of them benefit -- but there's no way to know which people will or whether the others don't because the dose is wrong. Too much aspirin can be as dangerous as too little.
AspirinWorks is being marketed now. It's offered through LabCorp, Quest Diagnostics and, in Wichita, AMS Laboratory.
The challenge, Ens said, is that labs have thousands of tests to choose from. "It's just one more test in the catalog."
But the potential also is great. The next step is to make AspirinWorks a test that could be used in a doctor's office, rather than being sent to a lab.
And because thromboxane levels, like cholesterol levels, can be affected by diet, someday AspirinWorks might be offered as a test that could be used at home by people who take fish oil or other supplements for their hearts.
"It essentially doubles the potential for this test," Ens said.
Ens is the only full-time employee of Creative Clinical Concepts. Bu
t the company should start seeing revenue from AspirinWorks soon. Then, he said, "It's time to grow it."
Reach Karen Shideler at 316-268-6674 or kshideler@wichitaeagle.com.
© 2007 Wichita Eagle and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved. kansas.com
kansas.com |
