Castle has three proprietary molecular diagnostic assays that are available for clinical use today:
Test for uveal melanoma (DecisionDx-UM)
Ocular melanoma, commonly known as uveal melanoma or choroidal melanoma, is the most common form of eye cancer.
The primary eye tumor is highly treatable. However, about half of patients are at high risk for near term liver metastasis (tumor spreading).
The DecisionDx-UM test measures the gene expression profile, also called GEP or molecular signature, of an individual's tumor and identifies with high accuracy the likelihood of metastasis.
The American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC, version 7, 2010) is the only national organization that reviews uveal melanoma. The AJCC recommends the DecisionDx-UM GEP test for use as the results are "clinically significant" for patient care. The DecisionDx-UM test is standard of care in the majority of ocular oncology practices.
Test for methylation profile of gliomas (DecisionDx-G-CIMP)
Gliomas are treated based on a grade of 2, 3 or 4. These grades are achieved through traditional, subjective histopathological techniques and are meant to predict likelihood of survival (prognosis).
While the grades are effective at predicting prognosis (survival), there is a wide range of individual survival within each grade and these ranges have considerable overlap.
DecisionDx-G-CIMP objectively identifies the methylation profile (so called CIMP+ or CIMP-) of a glioma and predicts survival for patients treated with standard of care.
Test for glioblastoma (DecisionDx-GBM)
Glioblastoma, also known as glioblastoma multiforme or GBM, is the most common and aggressive form of brain cancer.
GBM is diagnosed using traditional histopathology techniques, but these fail to identify an individual's prognosis or likelihood of response to current conservative treatment which consists of radiation with temozolomide.
DecisionDx-GBM allows doctors to identify those with a high likelihood of long-term response to this conservative treatment compared to those who may be refractory to the same treatment.