Founder-CEO Chase Spurlock

Nashville data science company IQuity Labs Inc. announced today that it has received a second $1 million Phase 2 grant from the National Institutes of Health's (NIH) Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program.

The grant, which will be dispersed over two years, will help IQuity expand its research efforts studying fibromyalgia syndrome and its place in the spectrum of rheumatic diseases and conditions, which also include rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and lupus. IQuity will work to further develop RNA-based technologies to detect fibromyalgia syndrome and monitor patient responses to treatment.

"This grant will allow us to expand the scope of our lab work at IQuity, enhancing the reliability of our future test offerings," said IQuity CEO Dr. Chase Spurlock. "In the field of medical research, one person's innovation tends to inspire another. So we see this benefiting not just us, but the entire research community."

IQuity has received a total of $2.3 million from the NIH's SBIR program, one of the country's largest sources of early-stage capital for technology commercialization. IQuity qualified for the Phase 2 grant by receiving a Phase 1 grant of $150,000 in 2017. IQuity also received a separate $1 million Phase 2 grant in 2017 to further its research into early detection methods for multiple sclerosis.

IQuity is one of just three Tennessee companies receiving a grant in the research project grant division in 2018. The grants are awarded at the end of an intensive peer review process.

"NIH judges your approach to solving the problem, the environment where the research is conducted, the significance of your work and whether the investigators have the expertise to carry out the work," Spurlock said. "Receiving this funding is affirmation by our peers of the importance of our work."

IQuity recently announced the release of its IsolateFibromyalgia™ blood test, which uses RNA analysis to help health care providers detect fibromyalgia syndrome quickly and accurately. Results are 94 percent accurate and are delivered to providers within seven days of receiving the sample in the laboratory.

IQuity's tests also include IsolateMS™, for multiple sclerosis, and IsolateIBS-IBD™, for irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), which includes Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis. All three tests are rooted in a suite of algorithms that compares the RNA profile from patient blood samples against a robust data set of healthy and sick patients identified through IQuity's research.

About IQuity:

IQuity, Inc. is a data science company using genomic and proprietary healthcare datasets to detect and monitor chronic disease. IQuity has developed game-changing blood tests using RNA data (genomic) to accurately detect autoimmune disease in its early stages. The application of data science and machine learning is at the core of the business and drives technological development. ###