Tremendous strides have been made in the fields of medicine and pharmaceuticals during the past century.||
These are the result of large and small advances made at laboratories, universities, and hospitals around the globe. Below is a look at four Norwegian companies that have made vital contributions to medical science and who are poised to continue their ground-breaking work.||
Ensuring reliable lab results||
Modern medicine is practiced just as much in the laboratory as in a hospital ward. Laboratory tests of human samples – such as for identifying and measuring viruses, bacteria, and microscopic components of the human body – are essential for determining a diagnosis, selecting the best course of treatment, and dispensing the right dose of medicine. The quality of a hospital or doctor’s office is therefore highly dependent on the quality of its laboratory. But how can one ensure that methods and equipment yield reliable results?||
Laboratory quality control is the answer. And it was invented in Norway.||
In the 1950s, Professor Lorentz Eldjarn conducted the world’s first successful experiments using a standardized control serum for internal quality control at his laboratory at Oslo University Hospital, Rigs hospital et. Thirteen years later, the company SE RO was born, and the world’s first commercially available control serum, Zero norm, was launched.||
SE RO is still a pioneer in quality control materials. It has a steadily growing portfolio of standard and tailor-made products that are used around the globe for quality control of lab tests and calibration of equipment. The global market for laboratory quality control is currently some USD 905 million. Thanks to Norwegian research, doctors and researchers worldwide can trust their lab results.||
The world’s first standardized control serum for quality control at laboratories was invented in Norway. SE RO|| Fighting cancer that has spread to the bones||
Some types of cancer are more difficult to treat than others. When cancer has spread to the bones, for example, there are few alternatives. Available treatments have major side effects and are of varying efficacy. Fortunately, a Norwegian company has found a way to slow bone metastases.||
Building on research conducted at Oslo University Hospital, Radium hospital et, Al, Zeta has developed a cancer drug based on radium-223, a radioactive isotope. While radium treatment of cancer was widespread in the past, it has more or less been replaced by alternatives with fewer side effects. Al zeta’s breakthrough is a targeted drug that is highly precise and has a short half-life, thereby minimizing side effects. The drug was launched under the name Alpharadin and is now called Xor Vigo.||
Some 1.3 million men are diagnosed with prostate cancer each year. Xor Vigo is used to treating prostate cancer when cancer has spread to the bones and is approved for use in both Europe and the US. Founded in 1997, Al zeta was acquired by the multinational company Bayer in 2011. However, production and research activities are still located in Norway, where work is being done to develop similar methods for treating breast cancer and lung cancer.||
Norwegian invention isolates DNA from cells||
In 1977, Professor John Ugelstad at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology managed to solve a problem that had been puzzling researchers for years: creating a set of microscopic beads of the same size. The professor and his team then went on to make these uniform beads magnetizable and found that they could be used to separate biological materials with extremely high precision.||
The company Danial was founded shortly after to further develop and commercialize the technology. The beads were given the name Diana's beads and have since been used in isolating and removing cancer cells, isolating DNA, tissue-typing in connection with organ transplantation, and HIV research.||
Diana's beads are still produced in Lille strum, near Oslo, and are used in roughly 80 percent of all oncological sequencing in Europe.||
Mapping blood flow in the heart Cardiovascular disease is the world’s most common cause of death, and the risk increases with age. Cardiac tests are thus some of the most fundamental medical procedures there are.||
When doctors examine whether a heart is beating as it should be, they use ultrasound, which provides a living picture of the heart’s functioning. However, at the end of the 1970s, there were no effective methods of obtaining a detailed picture of how the blood flows through the heart.||
This was remedied by the development of the world’s first Pulsed Echo Doppler Flow meter (PE DOF) at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. GE wing med Ultrasound further developed and commercialized the PE DOF machine, advancing ultrasound technology by using the Doppler effect to create a precise picture of where and how fast the blood flows through the heart. This gave doctors a new, more accurate tool for diagnosing disease and irregularities, which is now used to examine roughly 200 000 hearts each day.||
Given that the global population is aging, and cardiovascular disease is becoming more prevalent, the demand for GE wing med Ultrasound technology continues to grow. The technology, too, is steadily evolving. For example, the company recently launched the first pocket-sized ultrasound with two transducers in one probe, giving much greater flexibility in the use of ultrasound.||
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