The potential for abuse is extremely high when it comes to patients taking painkillers. Patients often have become addicted to their own medication and there are numerous reports of people selling these medications to those looking for a quick high. There hasn’t been an exact method for physicians to properly determine if their patients are taking prescribed medicines responsibly.

But Dominion Diagnostics (North Kingstown, Rhode Island) is offering an option that would give physicians better insight on the intake of patient-prescribed medicine.

The company has released Scientifically Accurate Medication Monitoring (SAMM), a clinical medication monitoring report that enhances the practice of pain and addiction medicine and allows physicians to better individualize treatment for patients in their care.

Dominion acquired SAMM from laboratory technology provider Waters (Worchester, Massachusetts) to develop the diagnostics test that is used for therapeutic monitoring.

“The relationship with Dominion goes back to 2006,” Brian Murphy, a spokesman for Waters, told Diagnostics & Imaging Week. Dominion, he said, “is a laboratory looking for ways to provide answers and insight to physicians more quickly.”

In early 2006, Dominion began specializing in clinical quantitative urine drug testing for pain and addiction medicine, to add liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry (LC/MS/MS) to its extensive laboratory menu through the acquisition of Waters ACQUITY UltraPerformance LC (UPLC)/TQD and Quattro Micro Mass Spectrometry (MS) systems.

This is how SAMM works.

The liquid chromatography is used to separate components of a mixture by using a variety of chemical interactions between the substance being analyzed (analyte) and the chromatography column. It in turn provides separation and identification of chemical agents found in the urine and bloodstream. The tandem mass spectrometry also aids in the separation, but also is able to give an identifier to the different substances found in a sample.

Both of these elements are found in SAMM, which includes validated screening for pain medications and their associated metabolites along with expert interpretation and support from Dominion’s team of clinical pharmacologists and MDs.

SAMM is generated for each quantitative testing profile that Dominion performs. Through SAMM, Dominion claims the assay offers a new level of interpretation and clinical support that has not been available to the pain medicine field to date, including quantitative information on prescribed and abused pain medications as well as information on the drug source. The company said it is the only laboratory of its kind providing scientifically validated and published data to support clinical interpretation and enhance patient pharmacotherapy.

With the addition of SAMM, Dominion enables physicians would be able to better monitor individual patient’s prescription compliance, identify potential diversion, and detect illicit drug use. SAMM is backed by Dominion’s clinical services team of pharmacologists, physicians, pharmacists and PharmDs.

“Waters’ technology and clinical applications expertise have enabled our business to get to another level in terms of the services, like SAMM, that we can offer our clients,” said Dr. Frank Fornari, CEO of Dominion Diagnostics. “The technology has allowed us to create a new model for clinical drug monitoring in pain management and addiction medicine.”

According to Dr. Robert Barkin, PharmD, the UPLC/MS/MS integrated solutions offers patient-specific, patient-centered objective data that pain management and other specialty clinicians have been requesting for years.

“Waters’ solutions, coupled with Dominion’s SAMM, offers the most comprehensive, scientifically-backed data that has ever been available to our industry,” Barkin said. “Now that we have the ability to interpret individual patient pharmacotherapy with this information, we can better focus our efforts on improving the quality of life and functional status of both our patients and their families.”

Dominion is a College of American Pathologists-accredited and CLIA-certified national medical laboratory specializing in advanced, state-of-the-art clinical quantitative urine drug testing and monitoring for pain management, addiction medicine, primary care, mental health and well-being, behavioral health and hospital systems.

The company said it is putting the finishing touches on a 30,000-square-foot addition to its corporate laboratory facility in North Kingstown, more than doubling its laboratory space.