Key Summary
- Upfront Dignostics launched LVOne, a rapid blood test to help identify stroke.
- It is approved for clinical use in the UK as it received UKCA marking.
- The initial rollout targets about 280 LAS vehicles covering North Central, North West, and North East London.
Upfront Diagnostics has launched LVOne, a rapid blood test to help identify large vessel occlusion (LVO) strokes in the pre-hospital setting.
The test has received UKCA marking, enabling clinical use in the United Kingdom, and is now being deployed in partnership with London Ambulance Service (LAS).
LVOne enables paramedics to spot severe stroke cases en route, directing patients straight to specialized centers offering mechanical thrombectomy, a time-critical procedure to remove large clots from brain arteries.
The initial rollout targets about 280 LAS vehicles covering North Central, North West, and North East London, serving around 6.5 million people. Over a six-month trial, paramedics will apply the finger-prick test for suspected stroke cases.
Gonzalo Ladreda, CEO and co-founder of Upfront Diagnostics, said that receiving the UKCA mark and launching LVOne represents a major milestone for Upfront Diagnostics and for stroke care more broadly.
“After eight years of research and development, we are now bringing this technology into real-world emergency care. Our goal is to give paramedics actionable information within minutes so patients with severe stroke can be transported directly to hospitals equipped to treat them,” he added.
LVOne measures two blood biomarkers - D-dimer (clot-related) and GFAP (brain bleed indicator) - to distinguish stroke varieties and flag likely LVO cases. Results emerge under 10 minutes from a finger-prick sample.
Pilot paramedics will pair LVOne with standard stroke evaluations and video triage to decide on direct routing to London's Hyper Acute Stroke Units (HASUs) for thrombectomy.
London Ambulance Service fields over two million calls yearly and serves a population of over nine million residents across the capital.
Upfront Diagnostics developed LVOne with support from the University of Cambridge and Newcastle University, Innovate UK, the NHS, SBRI Healthcare, Stroke Association and the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR).
