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Bayer Licenses Reflux Test From Wake Forest U. Health Sciences

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WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. — Bayer Healthcare's diagnostics division is licensing a new test for esophageal reflux disease developed at Wake Forest University Health Sciences.

Financial terms were not disclosed.

The test was developed by Jamie Koufman, a former professor of otolaryngology at Wake Forest University School of Medicine. She also was director of the school's for voice disorders. Koufman is currently the director of the Voice Institute in New York.

"Most people associate heartburn with excess stomach acid, but it is the digestive enzyme pepsin (and not acid) bathing the lower area of the esophagus that causes the damage," Koufman said. "For patients with severe esophagitis, the tissue in the esophagus is literally being self-digested."

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