MADISON, N.J., July 25, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Quest Diagnostics
Incorporated (NYSE:
DGX), the world’s leading provider of diagnostic testing,
information and services, today announced it will
unveil extensions to its women’s health and AccuType®
pharmacogenetic test menus, give eight scientific presentations and
host six scientific speakers during the American Association of
Clinical Chemistry (AACC) annual meeting and Clinical Lab Expo, to
be held in Atlanta, July 26-28, 2011 (Exhibit number 3130).

Spinal Muscular Atrophy Testing Now Available Broadly in the
U.S.

The extensions to the company’s women’s health menu feature
Athena Diagnostics’ spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) testing menu,
believed to be the most comprehensive in the diagnostics industry.
The services, which include adult-carrier screening and pre- and
post-natal disease assessment testing, are now nationally
available for the first time to physicians, laboratory
directors and other clients of Quest Diagnostics. The
offerings also position Quest Diagnostics as the only national
major laboratory to provide testing services to assess SMA disease
severity based on Athena’s analysis of the number of copies of an
SMA-associated gene.

Athena Diagnostics, which Quest Diagnostics acquired in April
2011, is the leader in neurology diagnostics and a pioneer in SMA
testing, which it has performed since 1996. Prior to the
acquisition, select Quest Diagnostics’ business units had offered
Athena Diagnostics’ SMA testing services in select regions
only.

The SMA adult-carrier screening test detects  a
defective survival motor neuron (SMN) 1 gene, which
determines an individual’s risk of passing SMA to offspring. The
pre- and post-natal disease assessment tests identify the number of
copies of the SMN2 gene, which affects disease severity.

SMA,

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