Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and health technology company Solu announce today a collaboration to study and understand hospital-acquired infections from an epidemiological and antibiotic resistance perspective. Solu offers an end-to-end service that provides insight into the causes of antibiotic resistance and whether the infection is hospital-acquired.
Hospital-acquired infections (HAIs) involve a multitude of issues. HAIs are often resistant to antibiotics, and the challenge to understand the risk and prevent the spread of HAIs remains a major problem. HAIs lead to longer hospital stays and increased costs, impact staff safety and the quality of care patients receive, and can even result in fatalities. Antibiotic-resistant HAIs are two to three times more likely to lead to a loss of life, according to the WHO (1).
The behavior of unique pathogens across various regions has not been well understood via conventional laboratory procedures. Genomic surveillance of HAIs has been shown to outperform traditional methods in identifying the source of HAIs (2), tracking transmission between patients (3), and tracing the transmission of antibiotic-resistance genes (4).
Solu is the pioneer in applying microbial genome sequencing for the analysis and management of hospital-acquired infections. Solu’s platform simplifies the sequencing and analysis process, offering a fast, user-friendly tool for microbiologists and epidemiologists. Collaborating with partner laboratories for sample analysis, Solu ensures results and insights are delivered in as little as three days, a significant improvement over traditional methods that can take up to two weeks. The data and insights from Solu provide epidemiologists with a comprehensive understanding of hospital-acquired infections, enhancing the ability to detect and prevent their spread.
The collaboration between Solu and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center aims to gain a comprehensive epidemiologic and genomic characterization, examine the correlation between antibiotic resistance and clinical outcomes, and explore the similarity of certain isolates. For the study, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center focuses on Carbapenem-resistant Gram-negative bacilli, Mycobacterium abscessus complex, and Candida auris.
Dr. Margie Morgan, Medical Director Microbiology at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, says: “We are excited to start this pilot collaboration and study with Solu. This study will broaden our understanding of resistance genes present in three key organism groups, their possible transmission in the patient population, and the clinical outcomes of these patients.”
Sam Sihvonen, co-founder and CEO of Solu, says: “We are honored to begin collaboration with Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. Hospital-acquired infections and antibiotic resistance are significant global health threats. With our technology, we can provide unprecedented insight into the causes of antibiotic resistance in pathogens, and determine whether they originate within the hospital or the community. By accurately detecting these infections and isolating affected patients, hospitals can prevent costly epidemics more effectively. This can significantly reduce costs, improve staff safety, and ultimately, save lives.”
About Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center is a nonprofit academic healthcare organization serving the diverse Los Angeles community and beyond. With pioneering medical research achievements, education programs defining the future of healthcare, and wide-ranging community benefit activities, Cedars-Sinai is setting new standards for quality and innovation in patient care.
About Solu
Solu is a Finnish technology company building a platform for hospitals for analysing and preventing infectious diseases. The company offers a software platform for genomic infection control and epidemiology which makes it easier to understand, detect, and prevent the spread of hospital-acquired infections and antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Solu collaborates on the analysis of bacterial genomes for multiple forward-thinking organizations around the world, such as Stanford University, and the University of Hamburg. Solu also recently introduced the fastest accessible online tool in the market, Candida.app, for analyzing Candida auris genomes to help epidemiologists better manage and prevent Candida auris outbreaks. Solu was founded in 2022 by Sam Sihvonen, Kerkko Visuri, and Timo Moilanen.
