King Faisal Specialist Hospital & Research Centre Joins BeginNGS® Consortium to Advance Newborn Screening by Genome Sequencing in the Region

BeginNGS Enables Early Detection of Hundreds of Treatable Genetic Disorders in Newborns

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, Oct. 7, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Rady Children's Institute for Genomic Medicine (RCIGM) today announced an agreement with King Faisal Specialist Hospital & Research Centre (KFSHRC), a leading healthcare, research, and education institution recognized across Middle East and Internationally for providing world-class medical care and advancing healthcare standards, to collaborate on implementing RCIGM's genome-based newborn screening platform, BeginNGS. Alexion, AstraZeneca Rare Disease is a cosignatory of the partnership and Platinum member of the BeginNGS Consortium. As a not-for-profit healthcare system, KFSHRC joins the BeginNGS Consortium as a Bronze level member.

Launched by RCIGM and its founding partners in 2022, BeginNGS is designed to prevent or minimize the effects of hundreds of childhood genetic diseases by identifying babies at risk and recommending effective therapies before symptoms arise. BeginNGS currently screens for 511 severe childhood genetic diseases with effective interventions at multiple hospitals in the United States.

Through this agreement, the Consortium will add diseases and genetic causes to the BeginNGS newborn screening platform, enabling the implementation of pilot studies tailored to meet the needs of the region's population. As BeginNGS scales and expands across the United States and internationally, Consortium members will support the program goal of implementing BeginNGS for 1,000 diseases in at least 10 countries by 2030.

"Every region of the world has its own distinct patterns and incidence of rare diseases," said Stephen Kingsmore, MD, DSc, President & CEO of RCIGM. "Understanding how they manifest across different geographies is essential to help identify effective, accessible therapies at the very beginning of life, before potentially devastating symptoms arise. KFSHRC is poised to become a leading model for precision medicine in childhood genetic diseases across the GCC region, as we seek to make this pioneering newborn screening technology accessible to everyone."

BeginNGS is made possible by the support and intellectual resources of BeginNGS Consortium members comprised of leading organizations in healthcare delivery, biopharma, biotech, information technology and patient advocacy, who are working together to create a new ecosystem for genome-informed healthcare delivery that can scale to meet the needs of countries worldwide.

"Momentum has been building in the region to advance care for rare diseases, and I am proud to see a new technology in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia that will strengthen rare disease diagnostics for patients," said Pelin Incesu, AVP Middle East and Africa, AstraZeneca. "As a partner of the BeginNGS Consortium, we continue to support its efforts to advance the global reach of critical diagnostic tools — the first step in the journey to care and treatment."

Media Contact: Ben Metcalf
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SOURCE The Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine (RCIGM)