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TUESDAY, JANUARY 31, 2006 MEDICAL DEVICE DAILY PAGE 4 OF 10MisonixContinued from Page 1ing or cutting the organ itself. The company said the treatmentmay be performed in either laparoscopic or intraoperativeprocedures.Michael McManus Jr., president and CEO of Misonix,said, "We are excited by the news from the FDA. This resultis an important milestone for our HIFU technology. Webelieve this technology will be used to the benefit of a largesurgical marketplace and related healthcare constituentsthat are constantly looking for innovative therapies."McManus said the latest approval helps to validate thecompany's decision last July to spin off its Laboratory andScientific Division in order to focus exclusively on thedevelopment of medical devices (Medical Device Daily, July26, 2005). “This milestone provides further validation of ourstrategic investments in developing our platform technologies,”he said. “We have carefully selected opportunities thathave significant growth potential and can also be deliveredto the market in efficient and fast development timeframes.For our shareholders, that means seeing our ultrasoundtherapeutic products in the market in the near term."”McManus noted that medical devices with marketpotential that are similar to those in Misonix’s productpipeline would typically take about “$5 million and fiveyears each to bring to market. We are demonstrating theability to significantly reduce the time to market for ourproducts.”The company said it expects the Sonatherm 600 to belaunched in markets outside the U.S. sooner than in the U.S.,Deals roundupUnited Surgical Partners adds24 centers with buy of SurgisA Medical Device Daily Staff ReportUnited Surgical Partners International (Dallas) reportedsigning an agreement to acquire Surgis (Nashville,Tennessee), a private surgery center company. Financialterms were not disclosed.Surgis operates 24 surgery centers and has an additionalseven facilities under development. Of the 31 totalfacilities, 20 are in markets currently served by UnitedSurgical Partners or its healthcare system partner. Surgisalso manages the endoscopy service in 42 acute-care hospitals.Surgis had revenues under management of $118 millionin 2005 and currently consolidates 13 of the 24 operationalfacilities.William Wilcox, CEO of United Surgical Partners, said,“This is a strategically attractive acquisition for the company.”United Surgical Partners has ownership interests in oroperates 104 surgical facilities. Of the company’s 101 domesticfacilities, 68 are jointly owned with not-for-profit healthcaresystems. The company also operates three facilities inLondon.The purchase is expected to be completed in March orApril, United Surgical said.In other dealmaking activity, IPC-The HospitalistCompany (North Hollywood, California) reported that ithas expanded into the Detroit area with the acquisition ofMichigan Hospitalists, a practice of about 70 providers.Already this year, IPC has announced expansions intoSalt Lake City and Ocala, Florida, and now has practice locationsin 19 markets nationwide.Michigan Hospitalists has been serving patients in thegreater Detroit area since 1997. The vast majority of its physicians,including President/Founder Gary Salem, DO, and partnersMichael Davis, MD; Paul Ragatzki, MD; Alan White, MD;and David Vandenberg, MD, have joined the IPC team.“We were at a critical juncture in our growth, and weknew that we would be able to achieve more by availingourselves of the vast resources offered by IPC,” said Salem.Hospitalists are acute-care specialists who focus on apatient’s hospital care from time of admission to discharge.IPC provides inpatient care in 20 markets nationwide,employing about 500 physicians and managing more than$1 billion in healthcare expenditures annually. ■where it will be ready for market in the 2007-2008 timeframe.“We will continue to invest in our already clearedproducts for wound debridement and bone cutting,”McManus said. “These investments will enable us to bringthese products to market in the short term and representsubstantial benefit to our shareholders.”He said the company is making progress in buildingout its present platform in laparoscopic surgery, neurosurgery,cosmetic surgery and the development of diagnosticproducts. “We will continue this record of growthinto the development of our European market for theSonoblate 500 for the treatment of prostate cancer and ournew products in the treatment of kidney tissue, wounddebridement and bone cutting,” McManus said. “The trueindicator of the success of our growth strategy is that eachof these new products is in a market segment considerablylarger than any of the present markets that we sell into.”In an interview on the Laboratory and Scientific Divisionspin-off, McManus also pointed to Misonix’s HearingInnovations (Tucson, Arizona) unit as offering growthopportunities. “We continue to believe in [Hearing Innovations']technology and are encouraged by recent studiesand articles on the benefits of ultrasonic bone conductionfor hearing loss. We will proceed with limited expense toconduct additional clinical work on the application for thistechnology.”On news of the FDA’s approval of the Sonatherm 600,shares of the company’s stock surged $2.14, or roughly47% to $6.70 at the close of Monday trading on theNasdaq. ■To subscribe, please call MEDICAL DEVICE DAILY Customer Service at (800) 688-2421; outside the U.S. and Canada, call (404) 262-5476.Copyright © 2006 Thomson BioWorld ® . Reproduction is strictly prohibited. Visit our web site at www.medicaldevicedaily.com.
TUESDAY, JANUARY 31, 2006 MEDICAL DEVICE DAILY PAGE 5 OF 10Grants/contractsClearant in accord with CTSfor the Clearant ProcessA Medical Device Daily Staff ReportClearant (Los Angeles), developer of the Clearant Process,reported that Community Tissue Services (CTS; Dayton,Ohio), a distributor accounting for about 10% of the $1 billionU.S. tissue market, has signed an agreement to adopt theClearant Process. CTS, with 10 locations throughout the countryin addition to its headquarters in Dayton, is one of thelarger non-profit tissue banks in the U.S., the company said.Investment firm Piper Jaffray has estimated the 2005U.S. tissue market to be approximately $1 billion andEmerging Grow-th Equities has forecasted a 15% to 20%annual growth rate for the market.The new agreement allows CTS to use the ClearantSterilization Service for a variety of human-sourced soft-tissueand bone allograft implants. CTS will initially begin toconvert its soft-tissue operations to the Clearant Process andthen migrate the technology to its hard-tissue processing.CTS can outsource the irradiation of hard- and soft-tissueallografts to Clearant. Clearant will then process theallografts using their proprietary technology.The Clearant Process is designed to substantiallyreduce all types of pathogens in biological products whilemaintaining a high degree of the underlying protein.Biophan Technologies (West Henrietta, New York), adeveloper of “next-generation” biomedical technology, saidthat it has joined as a senior member of the BiomimeticMicro-Electronic Systems Engineering Research Center atthe University of Southern California (USC/BMES ERC;Los Angeles), in a collaboration to revolutionize biomedicaldevices, including through development and integrationof Biophan’s proprietary innovations.The partnership gives Biophan access to the USC/BMESERC’s “world-class” research facilities, the company said.Biophan will contribute its expertise in advanced medicaldevice enhancement technologies to collaborate with theUSC center. Research will focus on the development of newmedical device solutions, including the application ofBiophan’s technologies to make medical devices MRI-safeand/or image compatible. Many implantable medicaldevices are currently contraindicated for use with MRI.Through an initial $17 million grant awarded by theNational Science Foundation (NSF; Arlington, Virginia),the USC/BMES ERC has been established to advance theeducation, research, and commercialization of biomedicaldevices that can dramatically improve the quality of life forpatients with debilitating diseases.Expanding into a new market segment, Bluegate(Houston) said it has signed an outsourced healthcare ITservices agreement with Northwest Oral and MaxillofacialSurgery (NWOMS; Woodlands, Texas). Bluegate is aprovider of outsourced healthcare IT solutions, professionaltechnology consulting services and the BluegateMedical Grade Network.In January Bluegate began to provide all IT outsourcingfor NWOMS’s six practices throughout Texas, including fullenterprise management for servers, storage equipment,backup equipment, desktops, notebooks, printers, switches,routers and firewalls; anti-virus services managementand removal of spyware, viruses and harmful software;quarterly network health check-ups; custom programming;IT policy and procedure planning; mandating and enforcingIT standards; and proactive enterprise monitoring servicesmanaged 24/7.These services are designed for healthcare organizationsthat want to adhere to best IT practices of HIPAA,technology and business relating to operating systempatches, locking down of desktops, roaming profiles andauditing. In addition, Bluegate will be assisting NWOMS indeploying Kodak’s PenCharts electronic medical record(EMR) system in all of its practices.NWOMS is a comprehensive, practice that uses extensiveimaging applications and is a national reference sitefor the Kodak PracticeWorks system. ■B RIEFLYN OTEDMedicare rate boosted for PlicatorNDO Surgical (Mansfield, Massachusetts) said Medicarehas increased the reimbursement rate for the Plicatorprocedure for the treatment of gastroesophageal refluxdisease (GERD). Effective Jan. 1, the hospital outpatient facilityreimbursement for the Plicator procedure increased byabout 7.5%.The Plicator procedure was first recognized for paymentunder Medicare’s hospital outpatient payment systemon April 1, 2005.NDO Surgical’s Full-Thickness Plicator is an endoscopicGERD treatment based on the principles of anti-reflux surgery.In an outpatient procedure, the Plicator is used tograsp, fold and fixate tissue at the junction between theesophagus and the stomach, thus tightening the valve thatacts as a barrier to gastric reflux.The company said the Plicator is the only endoscopicGERD treatment that mimics tissue restructuring performedduring anti-reflux surgery. It added that studieshave shown the Plicator procedure to be effective in reducingboth symptoms and medication use associated withGERD.More than 15 million Americans suffer from daily heartburn,the most common symptom of GERD. Until recently,treatment options for GERD have been limited to chronicdrug therapy or anti-reflux surgery, which requires generalanesthesia, multiple incisions and a recovery period lastingseveral days.To subscribe, please call MEDICAL DEVICE DAILY Customer Service at (800) 688-2421; outside the U.S. and Canada, call (404) 262-5476.Copyright © 2006 Thomson BioWorld ® . Reproduction is strictly prohibited. Visit our web site at www.medicaldevicedaily.com.
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