Dr. Arsonval Lamounier Júnior, medical director“We are a clinic before we are a laboratory,” says Dr. Arsonval Lamounier Júnior, medical director. “We place the patient and their family at the center of our approach.”
That orientation changes what a physician receives. Every genetic report arrives with a clinical case interpretation. The Cligen team reviews the findings, evaluates the literature relevant to the presentation and calls the referring physician directly. The effect is that, instead of filing the report, deferring to a specialist, or delaying a care decision, the clinician gains a colleague ready to reason through the result in real time. That conversation is what turns a genetic finding into a clinical action.
Cligen also maps its referring network, recognizing that physicians vary widely in their comfort with genetics. Those working near the limits of their genomic training receive targeted education, invitations to scientific meetings and direct collaboration on complex cases. As clinicians gain confidence, they order more appropriate tests, interpret results more accurately and deliver better care. Each interaction strengthens the network’s collective genomic literacy.
The same logic shapes Cligen’s test portfolio. Rather than offering an overwhelming catalog, the clinic curates high-quality, certified assays with broad gene coverage, organized by clinical presentation. The diagnostic strategy follows the clinical question, ensuring that the right test reaches the right patient without delay.
What Blood Could Not Show
Cligen’s approach matters most when a case resists resolution. A newborn presented with bilateral epibulbar ocular tumors and cutaneous lesions arranged along the lines of Blaschko, sharply respecting the midline. Whole exome sequencing on peripheral blood had returned negative. Without a different strategy, the child’s condition would have remained undiagnosed and no clear clinical path forward existed.
The clinical team recognized the signature of cutaneous mosaicism and recommended sequencing DNA extracted from the lesional tissue. The analysis identified a postzygotic KRAS variant present in the lesion and absent from blood, confirming an oculocutaneous mosaic RASopathy. That diagnosis enabled a structured multisystem surveillance plan across ophthalmologic, dermatologic, neurologic and skeletal care. It also gave the family a critical assurance that the risk of recurrence for future children was negligible.
“What a blood only exome had left unanswered, interrogating the right tissue resolved into a precise diagnosis and a confident clinical course,” says Dr. Lamounier Júnior.
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We are a clinic before we are a laboratory. We place the patient and their family at the center of our approach.
“What a blood only exome had left unanswered, interrogating the right tissue resolved into a precise diagnosis and a confident clinical course,” says Dr. Lamounier Júnior.
Innovation on Honest Terms
Every emerging technology undergoes clinical validation and cost benefit analysis before adoption. A recent assessment paired a rapid urinary beta amyloid test with APOE genotyping for Alzheimer’s disease risk. The assay has not yet been incorporated into clinical guidelines and requires further validation, but together, the tools represent a meaningful advance in personalized risk assessment. Cligen offers a combination with full transparency about evidential limits, because setting honest expectations before testing is part of the clinical service.
Accessibility follows the same discipline. Cligen operates in person in Vitória and by telemedicine across Brazil. Partnerships with insurers and public hospitals, combined with fair pricing, bring precision medicine within reach of patients who might otherwise go without. More than 5,000 have received care since 2021.
Genomic medicine generates more data and more complexity every year. A genetic finding becomes clinically useful only when someone with the right training explains what it means and what to do. Cligen has built its practice around being that someone. Life Sciences Review recognizes Cligen among its Top Genomic Testing Solutions in Latin America 2026.
Genomic Testing Built Around Clinical Interpretation
Genomic testing decisions often stall before a sample reaches the laboratory. A physician may know the clinical question, yet still face uncertainty over which assay fits the presentation and whether the report will provide useful direction for the next clinical decision. For care teams, that uncertainty can mean more time spent reviewing options, managing referrals and explaining an already complex process to families. Each unclear order can consume specialist time before it produces clinical direction. A strong testing partner cannot behave like a distant processor of samples. It has to reduce the gap between genetic data and clinical action.
The most serious failure pattern is not a missed specimen pickup or a slow report, though both matter. It is the delivery of technically valid findings without enough clinical framing for the treating physician. Variants and negative results carry different weight depending on phenotype, family history, tissue source and the limits of the assay itself. Buyers should look closely at how a provider supports interpretation after sequencing. A report that forces the clinician to restart the literature review alone creates hidden work for the care team. Better models connect the laboratory result to the case question and give physicians a way to discuss findings when uncertainty remains.
Test selection deserves the same scrutiny. Broad menus can appear impressive, yet excess choice can leave clinicians comparing panels that overlap without answering the case. A better genomic testing program makes breadth usable. Gene coverage should be matched with recognizable clinical presentations, while exome sequencing, targeted panels, chromosomal analysis and broader genome work should sit within a coherent ordering path. Referral clinics also need guidance when the first result does not match the phenotype. Tissue choice, assay limits, variant classification and follow-up counseling can change the direction of the case. The goal is not to offer every possible assay. It is to help physicians choose the test, sample or next step most likely to answer the clinical question.
Access is not a soft issue in genetics. Counseling time, digital appointments, insurance pathways and fair pricing affect whether testing moves from specialist discussion to patient care. Clinics serving families across different income levels need partners that can explain complexity without creating pressure to test. The same caution applies to emerging tools. New biomarkers may be promising, but adoption should account for validation status and cost before expectations harden. Providers should be equally clear about what emerging tests can and cannot yet establish, especially when evidence is still forming and clinical guidelines have not caught up. This reflects Cligen’s stated approach to emerging technologies: evaluating clinical validation and cost-benefit while communicating uncertainty to patients.
Cligen takes this clinic-centered approach to genomic testing, placing clinical interpretation alongside laboratory analysis rather than treating the report as the end of the process. Genetic counseling, medical consultations and genomic testing sit within a model designed to help physicians and families understand what a result means for the case at hand. Cligen pairs genetic reports with case-level interpretation, can engage referring physicians directly and shares relevant scientific literature when a case calls for deeper discussion. Its testing portfolio is organized around broad clinical presentations rather than an extensive menu that leaves physicians to navigate overlapping options on their own. For clinics balancing diagnostic clarity with access, Cligen connects genomic testing with the clinical reasoning needed to put results into context.
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