In November 2020, three additional private health facilities – FEU-NRMF, Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, and DLSU Medical Center, joined the Philippine Private Sector Diagnostics Consortium (The Consortium), a network established to provide diagnostic TB tests at a concessional pricing among Filipinos.

“We thank our partners from USAID, PhilCAT, and the Consortium for making it possible to set up a procurement system that allows us to provide more affordable diagnostic TB tests to our clients,” said Mr. Juan Enrique Reyes, Chief Operating Officer of the Far Eastern University-Nicanor Reyes Medical Foundation (FEU-NRMF) at the opening of its molecular diagnostic laboratory.

Now equipped with their own GeneXpert machines, the said facilities can now run up to 30 tests per month that can provide results in as fast as four hours.

The Consortium already has now a total membership of 15 private hospitals including VRP Medical Center, Medical Center Manila, Chinese General Hospital, Tropical Disease Foundation, Hi-Precision Diagnostics, The Black Nazarene Inc. ACE Medical Center Bohol, Bernadette Bautista Clinic, among others.

With this game-changing initiative, private facilities can now offer affordable GeneXpert testing with a 72% cost reduction compared to other private hospitals and clinics and address catastrophic costs experienced by patients and their family members.

Since its launch in February 2020, the Consortium has assisted private hospitals and laboratories to procure discounted WHO-recommend diagnostics tools for TB tests. It also aims to expand its membership and diagnostics portfolio for both TB and non-TB care.