UK LifeScience: Edition 3

Issue 3

United Kingdom

A D V A N C E S

I N

H E A L T H

T E C H N O L O G Y

INDUSTRY

Can Industry save the NHS? What’s in the first aid kit?

Healthcare at home and on the move Early diagnosis and prevention Productivity and efficiency

NICE advice: Guide to health technology evaluation Teamwork: Medilink UK and ABHI sign concordat

Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

A stronger voice for the life science industry: at home, away and online With an increased Government focus on NHS adoption of new healthcare devices and procedures, and the changing procurement landscape, it’s critical that all companies in the health technology sector have a strong voice and that they use this impetus to bring more innovation to market and improve patient care.

With that in mind, Medilink UK is strengthening its voice and influence starting with the signing of a Concordat with the Association of British Healthcare Industries. Bringing OEMs, large medtech firms and SMEs together, we’ll be working even closer to protect and promote the interests of the health technology industry in Westminster and Brussels.

We know a lot about brand development

design & marketing

Branding Web Print Marketing

Looking further afield to Latin America, Medilink UK has just signed an agreement with ABIMO – the Brazilian Association of Industries of Medical, Dental, Hospital and Laboratories Devices and Equipments. With the region experiencing rapid growth and Brazil spending over £350 million each year on medical device imports alone, we’re seizing opportunities for the UK life science industry at home and away.

In this issue of UK Lifescience Industry magazine, we’ll be featuring news from ABHI members as well as the latest from the South West Biomedical iNet, who also join us as a magazine partner. This will provide new opportunities, initiatives and ideas that will benefit Medilink UK members and further demonstrate the strength of our industry.

For more national opportunities, I’d urge you to take a quick look at the new MedilinkUK.com site, which will officially launch later this year. Featuring thought-provoking blogs, breaking healthcare news, expert comment, business intelligence and market guides, it brings together the collective knowledge of Medilink UK’s experts and associates.

Tony Davis Chairman, Medilink UK

Communication Packaging Feasibility

PUBLISHED BY

www.teamworksdesign.com Specialists in design and marketing for the Life Science and Medical Technology sector

www.medilinkuk.co.uk

CON T E N TS

Issue 3

PROJECTS

FEATURES

Listening and learning

Can Industry save the NHS?

4-9

Putting the stops on cancer

13

Breathe again

16

Putting dehydration to bed

17

Life science event calendar

18-19

In brief

20-26

With £20 billion savings needed in the NHS by 2014, the healthcare community must join forces to bring about important changes.

Involving the NHS, industry, academia and sector support organisations, good communication between these communities will speak volumes.

PRODUCTS

MedTech benefits from Teamwork

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CALENDAR

Jess Fisher Editor

7 Schooner Way, Atlantic Wharf, Cardiff CF10 4DZ Tel: 029 2047 3456 The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily represent the opinions of individual Medilink UK members unless explicitly stated. © MediWales Ltd. 2011

Web: www.mediwales.com

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Gene genius

Produced by MediWales for Medilink UK Designed by Teamworks Design & Marketing Contact: Editor Advertising & Coordination

jess.fisher@mediwales.com ruth.campbell@mediwales.com

2011 ISSUE 3

From systems to deliver ‘shared care’ online, to collaborative research projects offering advancements in early diagnosis of diseases, the ‘project’, ‘product’ and ‘in brief ’ sections highlight some of the innovations currently influencing clinical pathways.

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PROJECTS

The lead feature provides a brief overview of the current relationship between the life science industry and the NHS, highlighting issues surrounding innovation uptake into the NHS, with suggestions from industry for how this can be improved. A glance at industry-led lean methodologies makes suggestions for how the NHS could make the necessary budget savings.

Proving the value of Innovation

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Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Can Industry save the NHS? The NHS is changing through necessity, with the UK companies who sell to it having a vested interest in its evolution. Jess Fisher, with the aid of industry stakeholders, explores current pitfalls with technology adoption and how these innovations and the use of industry-led lean practices can help the NHS financially and improve patient care.

2011 ISSUE 3

To understand how innovative technology and lean methodology adoption can help the NHS make a dent in the £20 billion cost savings needed by 2014, it’s important to identify the current bottlenecks. The UK’s life science industry, having run the routeto-market gauntlet when trying to sell their medical technologies to the NHS, know that any new innovation must be cost effective and improve current clinical pathways. For instance, open heart surgery has largely been replaced with key hole surgery - a less invasive and time consuming operation. This new technology-led clinical pathway has saved the NHS considerable money whilst reducing the recovery time and risk of infection for patients - an obvious win-win. So then why does industry struggle to get similar cost saving technologies and processes into the NHS market place?

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Firstly, technology alone does not drive efficiencies - it is part of the solution but can present new problems.

In its broadest sense, technology is evolving faster than many institutions are capable of adopting and there is little evidence that newer, shinier technologies can create savings. A new technology means a change of process, which increases immediate delivery costs and can introduce new risks.

A secondary problem when the NHS is the buyer is silo budgeting, where each NHS Trust or Primary Care Trust (PCT) is concerned with meeting individual budget targets.

If a new technology can deliver cost savings across several departments, then who should pay for the frontend costs of this innovation? Current compartmentalised budgeting restricts process innovation and the adoption of lean methodologies that work so well

for industry. Just as common is the NHS’s unwillingness to look at a technology’s potential cost saving long term.

Lastly, improved efficiencies may not reduce costs. The delivery of a better service, for example reduced waiting times, lends itself to improved capacity; the time saved will be replaced by more patients.

Experiencing some of these bottlenecks is the sub-sector ehealth. Ranging from point-of-care diagnostic sensors to technology used to simplify the processing of patient records, innovations within this area are varied and growing. Numerous disruptive diagnostic technologies are enabling people to receive increased care at home – beneficial for patients, whilst reducing the number of hospital or clinic consultations, which frees up bed space and saves money.

FE AT U R E S

In an attempt to create healthy market places for industry, the NHS conducted the ‘pause, listen and reflect exercise’, recruiting groups of independent participants to make up The NHS Future Forum. These groups attended around 200 events and met more than 6,700 people face to face to gather public opinion on the healthcare system they want. Across a series of papers the forum has made 16 recommendations outlining how the Government should restructure the NHS. One recommendation in particular is very interesting with regards to procurement of innovations into the NHS: ‘competition should be used to secure greater choice and better value

for patients – it should be used not as an end in itself, but to improve quality, promote integration and increase citizen’s rights’.

If recommendations such as this are adhered to, the uptake of innovative technology should be encouraged, creating a healthy market place for service providers and manufacturers based on quality of care.

From examining the bottlenecks and acknowledging the NHS’s desire to devise future strategy based on stakeholder opinion, it would be naïve to assume the need for change is the NHS’s alone: in order to address the market’s needs, industry must become active partners in the change of healthcare provision, including in the research that underpins it.

With the support of funding bodies, industry is upping its game by collaborating with academia to make advances in personalised care through stratified medicine initiatives.

The Technology Strategy Board and the Medical Research Council are jointly investing over £3.7 million in seven new research projects in this

area. Forming part of the Stratified Medicines Innovation Platform (SMIP), innovative research and development will occur in areas such as tumour profiling to improve cancer care and the development of biomarkers for more effective drugs.

The Technology Strategy Board’s Chief Executive, Iain Gray, said: “Here in the UK we have many of the strengths needed to accelerate the innovation of stratified – or personalised – medicines and to become a world leader in developing medicines aimed at smaller sub-groups of patients. These investments are the first in a programme that is bringing scientific research, businesses and policymakers together to develop the personalised, targeted drugs and treatments of the future.”

Several of the SMIP projects relate to developing new value systems by determining the best ways to co-develop drugs and companion diagnostics, and how subsequent reimbursement can be distributed across the value chain. Potentially, the number of stratified treatments will increase, along with the speed in which they’re adopted by healthcare providers.

2011 ISSUE 3

Industry is driving this change of care, involving I.T. specialists, health workers, and industry manufacturers to make a range of point-of-care diagnostics. Here, industry can play a large part in positively impacting the NHS, however for any business there needs to be a viable commercial market to sell to. The market for primary care is clear – the NHS pay for it, yet once care moves into the community the buyer is less obvious. Without viable market drivers, or at least potential that industry can see, these ehealth initiatives may be stifled.

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Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Advances in personalised medicine however may help develop biomarkers that indicate what is likely to work for a specific patient.

With clinicians, academics and businesses working together to understand stratification of patient sub-groups through biomarkers, improvements in patient benefit and cost savings can be made by more targeted therapies.

2011 ISSUE 3

Stratification will most likely result in a change of business model for pharmaceutical companies as the market of med-takers will narrow, yielding shorter drug runs and revenues. Currently, drugs are sold according to value-based pricing – essentially how beneficial they are. For instance, patients can try 4-5 varieties of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) before they find one that works, which is expensive and distressing.

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Where pharma struggles, diagnostics will thrive, with the solution being the two working closely together. An example of this type of collaboration was announced in August 2011

between Pfizer and QIAGEN with their move to develop a companion lung cancer diagnostic for use with an investigational Pfizer compound in global clinical development for treatment of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). This creates the opportunity for simultaneous drug and diagnostic regulatory approval and with the FDA supporting such collaborations, manufacturing and commercialization are becoming catalysed.

Alongside these new collaborative value systems, adopting more industry-based management structures could result in significant NHS savings.

Chris Lloyd of Simpler Consulting Ltd, in the August edition of the Clinical Services Journal, offered a reassuring argument that necessary cost savings can be achieved without changes to frontline services through the use of lean methodologies – so often practiced by industry.

Lean methodologies have been responsible for saving millions of pounds within healthcare trusts by

FE AT U R E S

analysing their processes and patient throughput. For instance, Alder Hey Children’s NHS Foundation’s adherence to lean methodologies evolved into adopting the Rapid Improvement Service Transformation Programme (RIST). Productivity across the Trust increased by 5%, with all first appointments being conducted within five weeks. 98% of A&E patients are now seen within four hours, and the foundation has the lowest MRSA infection rate in the North West. The length of patient stay for the whole hospital has also been reduced by 10%, with reduced costs by over £10m in the past two years.

Although this case study is encouraging, what is unlikely to sit well with senior NHS decision makers is the time it takes to realise savings and income accrual through lean process changes. The immediate effects are often intangible, harder

to evidence, and in some instances appear a step backwards.

The process changes required will likely occur through the appointment of lean-thinking senior managers who will implement new procedures from the top-down. Industry can provide a helping hand through their innovations that are designed with quicker, simpler processing in mind.

There are several schemes in place to pull such innovations through the procurement landscape into the NHS. For instance, the Innovative Technology Adoption Procurement Programme (iTAPP), part of the Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention (QIPP) programme, encourages NHS-wide adoption of high impact innovative medical technologies that can improve the quality of patient care whilst contributing over £1 billion in productivity gains.

So far, seven of the ten regions have made a total of seventeen technology selections, encompassing twelve different medical technologies.

Programmes such as these appear successful on paper, however how do industry perceive innovation uptake by the NHS? The Association of British Healthcare Industries (ABHI), with the support of Medilink UK, has requested the views of its members - key industry players across the UK - to feed into a report for the NHS Chief Executive on innovation in the NHS to be published in November 2011.

This initiative, announced in the Plan for Growth, is being led by Sir Ian Carruthers, Chair of the NHS Life Sciences Innovation Delivery Board and Chief Executive of NHS South West.

When asked what the NHS can learn from industry best practice to accelerate the pace and scale of adoption of innovation throughout the NHS, comments from this spectrum of UK life science companies, both manufacturers and suppliers, highlighted the following insights:

With regard to how the NHS can innovate more quickly and consistently, Bruce comments, “In terms of the

NHSBT blood donor chair designed by Renfrew Group International

spread of innovation, this is down to comprehensive internal PR within the NHS and ensuring that throughout all departments, a grassroots understanding of the importance of innovating is established – staff need to see that their ideas and enthusiasm

are recognised. But this is hardly revolutionary – similar relationships have been successfully operating in industry for years, but when procuring new technologies into the NHS, there must also be internal champions to take ideas forward.”

2011 ISSUE 3

Bruce Renfrew from Renfrew Group International, product design specialists based in Leicester, believes that to speed up innovative uptake the NHS should adopt new and popular methods of seeking the views of industry. “Crowd sourcing is the latest buzz term being bandied about by those charged with nurturing innovation in large organisations – gathering free IP is another description. The NHS certainly has no shortage of feedstock in this regard but achieving a faster take up of ideas is quite another thing. Incentives and buy-in are the major prerequisites in adoption and this is as much about realising a common culture between industry and the NHS as it is about best practise or the application of the latest methodologies.”

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Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Andrew Davidson, from DTR Medical Ltd, a sterile single-use instrument manufacturer based in Swansea, suggests that rather than solely looking to best practice from elsewhere, the NHS should analyse the shortcomings of its current system.

“Some hospital groups such as BMI, Spire, and Nuffield, together with Independent Sector Treatment Centres such as Care UK, are quicker to uptake new innovations because they understand the impact of savings and efficiency.

“Some of the earlier commissioning groups seem to recognise this; their motivation is about making money from the system, and this creates a strong commercial attitude that is more likely to produce results.

“These smaller hospital groups appear to have a simple business plan approach, which has a good mix of clinical and business management.

This is often unclear in the NHS and a simplified process would help the internal clinical lead implement

2011 ISSUE 3

Alan Press from West Midlands’ company Kimal, a medical device manufacturer for the diagnostic and interventional cardiology, radiology, renal disease and oncology markets, questions how the proposed efficiency savings will be made, based on their own experiences trying to sell their home dialysis device:

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“Getting new technologies and best practise to spread rapidly in the NHS is currently almost impossible. We have a perfect example in home dialysis.

Everything is in place with a NICE recommendation; we have evidence and a new tariff which supports movement home, and yet over two years on, the total patient numbers has marginally increased perhaps from 1.5% to 2% of the patient population. Even with all the boxes ticked adoption is so slow, so how will the efficiency savings be made?

DTR Medical’s Single-use Shea Ear Specula

recognised improvement with business manager support.

“Current NHS contracts more often than not dissuade innovation as high volume long term contracts create vested interests between industry providers and the procuring departments. The Department of Health’s home oxygen provision contract is a good example of restrictive practice, preventing patients obtaining the best new home oxygen generator treatment in England and Wales, whilst Scotland and Ireland’s less restrictive contracts mean their patients benefit.”

DTR Medical’s Sterile Single-use Tibbs Cannula

Commenting on the NHS system specifically in Wales, Andrew continued, “I have just learnt of the desire to appoint more lean thinking senior managers in the Welsh NHS. This seems like an excellent move because it recognises healthcare provision involves production line parallels, which the NHS really should be adopting. If these individuals are given the opportunity to thrive, they will see the benefits of better use of resources, faster throughput, and greater capacity to reduce waiting times whilst not compromising on quality.”

“External bodies can provide advice, evidence, support, training etc but without a fundamental “make it happen” top down directive, innovation will continue at a snail’s pace.”

NxStage System One distributed by Kimal: a haemodialysis system for home use

FE AT U R E S

Sue Moody from Hull based Smith & Nephew Healthcare Ltd, highlights a challenge that many suppliers to the NHS come across: the NHS’s focus on the cost per unit rather than cost savings across an entire clinical pathway. Similar to Andrew Davidson and Alan Press, Sue finds that although their company can offer excellent costsavings data, the pressure on NHS’s procurement means they are not aligned to companies with innovative products, meaning significant system savings are not taken advantage of due to how tenders are structured.

“NHS organisations rarely request cost-effectiveness information when carrying out more formalised tendering/evaluation processes and therefore comparisons are made on

unit costs rather than the overall cost of managing/ treating a therapy,” explains Sue. “It would be useful to have more opportunities to share this data with them as cost-saving exercises tend to mean that lower cost, less innovative products are procured, which restrict clinicians’ ability to choose products that take an innovative approach to treating patients and saving on overall treatment costs, plus improving the patient experience.

“It also would be useful if procurement personnel attended educational meetings e.g. Best Practice meetings so that they can gain a greater understanding of quality of life issues and ways improved clinical practice and adoption of alternative innovative

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products could improve patient satisfaction.”

In light of the above discussions, can industry save the NHS? There is undoubtedly no definitive answer, yet these industry comments offer an insight into the current, realtime issues that impede innovation uptake and cost savings in the NHS, with suggestions for how some barriers could be dismantled.

The impact of the listening exercise and the Future Forum Report are yet to be fully realised but hopefully these initiatives are indicative of a continued willingness from the Government and the NHS to listen and work with industry to collectively build a leaner, stronger, and better healthcare system in the UK.

Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Proving the value of Innovation The NICE Medical Technologies Evaluation Programme (MTEP): value for the NHS and for the life science industry, by Mark Campbell, Associate Director, MTEP The NICE Medical Technologies Evaluation Programme (MTEP), launched in November 2009, represents an increase in capacity for evaluation of devices and diagnostic technologies. The programme aims to promote rapid and consistent adoption of innovative medical technologies in the NHS in England, where these offer particular clinical benefits.

Scope of the Programme The MTEP supports a new NICE independent advisory body – the Medical Technologies Advisory Committee (MTAC) – in its two main functions: 1. The selection of innovative medical technologies and routing of these to the appropriate NICE guidance producing programme, for example: l Medical technologies as defined in EU

directives 1 covering medical devices, in vitro diagnostic medical devices, and active implantable medical devices

l Software which drives a clinical device l Genetic tests which have a medical

purpose (as defined in EU regulations)

2. The development of its own recommendations which are issued as Medical Technology Guidance.

The MTEP sits within the Centre for Health Technology Evaluation at NICE, both complementing and operating in conjunction with NICE’s existing guidance producing programmes.

Technologies eligible for selection and evaluation should be new, innovative or present a significant modification to an existing technology. Technologies should have potential to offer substantial benefits for the patient and/or the NHS, for example implantable drug delivery devices; devices enabling less invasive surgery that aid recovery times; faster diagnostic tests or a test which replaces several existing tests; or a technology enabling the move from inpatient to outpatient treatment. High quality scientific evidence supporting these advantages will increase the likelihood of a technology being suitable for evaluation.

2011 ISSUE 3

Topic selection and the case for adoption

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MTEP is a notification-led programme which invites sponsors to notify potentially eligible topics. A topic sponsor is usually the manufacturer or distributor, although

anyone may tell the programme about a technology of interest. The basis of the notification is the case for adoption (or value proposition or, simply, business case). This should articulate clearly the advantages of using the single product in a defined group of patients, in place of the current standard of care (the comparator) and with particular emphasis on the improvements in patient outcome, reduction in resource consumption, and NHS system benefits such as service redesign.

On the basis of the notification, and with clinician and patient expert input, NICE prepares a briefing note on the basis of which MTAC decides whether the product shows sufficient promise to select it for guidance development. If so, it then decides which programme within NICE would be most appropriate to carry out that evaluation. Medical technologies may be routed to the Medical Technologies Evaluation Programme, the Diagnostics Assessment Programme or to other programmes such as Interventional Procedures or Technology Appraisals where appropriate.

Types of evidence and economic analysis The MTEP has been designed to evaluate medical technologies typically early in their lifecycle when the evidence base is otherwise sparse by comparison with, for example, drugs. All forms of relevant published and unpublished evidence are considered including patient and clinical expert advice. Topics selected for medical technologies guidance must show promise of more benefit for the same cost or the same benefit for less cost. The NHS is interested in such technologies for consideration as part of its QIPP and iTAPP initiatives. Cost consequence analysis is used, rather than cost-effectiveness or cost-utility, in evaluating the resource consequences of the technology.

Manufacturer involvement and timescales MTEP is guided by the sponsor notification and, during medical technologies guidance development, the manufacturer submission, which is scrutinised by an independent academic assessment centre. During the process the sponsor is consulted and key documents are shared for fact-checking and then published. All medical technologies draft guidance is published for one month’s public consultation. Following this consultation, a final draft guidance document is produced which is subject to a pre-publication error-checking process, before final guidance is published.

MTEP aims to let manufacturers know whether a notified product has been selected for guidance within 10 weeks of receiving the notification, and to publish final medical technology guidance within 38 weeks of selection.

Notifying a medical technology to NICE NICE has worked hard with key stakeholders to ensure that the MTEP has distinct characteristics which meet their needs but maintains the highest standards of health technology evaluation. For the NHS this results in support, where justified by the evidence, for the adoption of innovative technologies, resulting in better patient outcomes or more efficient services.

For industry, the notification-led model encourages the submission of innovative technologies while the evaluation methodology allows consideration early in the product lifecycle, at a time when technologies are typically introduced to the NHS. For more information on the programme please visit www.nice.org.uk/mt.

For an informal discussion about notifying a topic, or for any further information, please e-mail: medtech@nice.org.uk.

F E AT U R E S

MedTech benefits from Teamwork ABHI and Medilink UK – Working Together to Support the Medical Technology Industry ABHI and Medilink UK are exploring how they can work together to improve industry representation to Government, Whitehall and in Europe and to improve access to NHS clinical evaluation opportunities. Members will also benefit through joint events and the sharing and development of information.

The purpose of the concordat is to create a framework for joint working in order to: l Create a favourable political and

economic environment for the medical technology industry

l Develop policy on NHS purchasing

and on UK uptake of medical technology

l Develop a coordinated approach to

international trade to improve support for SMEs

l Encourage adoption of the principles

set out in the ABHI Code of Business Practice

Tony Davis, Chairman of Medilink UK said- “It’s a natural fit for our two organisations to work closely for the betterment of UK healthcare and industry. The statistics and anecdotes we gather from day-to-day work with SMEs supports the crucial work ABHI is doing to raise the profile of the medical technology industry within Government. The healthcare supply chain is strong within the UK, made up of nearly 4,500 companies, with innovative solutions that can go a long way towards achieving the savings and patient experience goals of the NHS. The concordat gives us the structure to work together to encourage the adoption of

Featuring Peter Ellingworth, CEO of ABHI (left) and Tony Davis, Chairman of Medilink UK

these innovative UK technologies for the benefit of UK patients.”

Peter Ellingworth Chief Executive of ABHI said- “The concordat will allow ABHI and Medilink UK to improve the representation of the medical technology industry in the UK. By working together we can provide increased benefits to our members and help ensure that UK patients benefit from the latest and most innovative technologies. This collaboration will strengthen both our organisations; joint representation will help us raise the profile of the sector and improve the value of membership through sharing information and access to events.

“This is a crucial time for the NHS and the medical technology industry wants to engage and support it. The much discussed £20 billion savings target will only be achieved if the NHS is willing to change the delivery of healthcare, something medical technology can enable them to do. It is important that industry has a strong voice and is explaining this to the NHS and policy makers, that is why I am delighted to have signed the concordat and I look forward to working closely with Medilink UK.” Association of British Healthcare Industries The Association of British Healthcare Industries (ABHI) is the industry association for the UK medical technology sector. Their aim is to

promote the rapid adoption of medical technologies to ensure optimum patient outcomes throughout the UK and in key global markets.

Medilink UK Medilink UK is a national health technology business support organisation.

Medilink UK helps companies from concept through to commercialisation and nurtures collaborations between academics, clinicians and industry.

Businesses have four easy ways to access Medilink UK’s team of experts: Subscribe to specialist online business support, join a local Medilink for personalised assistance, buy bespoke market reports and services, and attend a Medilink event.

ABHI- Dan Jones, Director of Communications Tel: 0207 960 4377 Email: daniel.jones@abhi.org.uk Web: www.abhi.org.uk Medilink UK- Michelle Dalton, Communications Director Tel: 0121 452 5630 Email: michelled@medilinkwm.co.uk Web: www.medilinkuk.com

2011 ISSUE 3

The Association of British Healthcare Industries and Medilink UK have announced the signing of a formal concordat to support joint working and achieve maximum impact for the medical technology industry. This UK sector represents nearly 4,500 companies employing 55,000 people with a turnover of £13 billion. ABHI and Medilink UK will now work closely to ensure that UK patients benefit from access to the latest and most innovative medical devices.

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PROJ E CTS

Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Gene genius Scientists are shedding new light on the molecular basis of lung diseases thanks to a collaboration between the Universities of Leicester and Nottingham, with the help of a £50,000 grant from the Healthcare and Bioscience iNet, a project part-financed by the European Regional Development Fund and managed by Medilink East Midlands.

Also involved is the Nottingham-based international diagnostic and genetic analysis company Source BioScience, providing its next generation sequencing services. This collaboration, including two internationally-renowned teams of researchers, has attracted new investment to the two universities worth over £900,000 from pharmaceutical giant Pfizer.

The collaboration builds on the work of a consortium, comprising 96 scientists from 63 centres led by Professor Martin Tobin, Professor of Genetic Epidemiology and Public Health in the Department of Health Sciences and the Department of Genetics at the University of Leicester and Professor Ian Hall, Dean of the Medical School and Deputy Director of the Nottingham

Biomedical Research Unit in Respiratory diseases at the University of Nottingham.

Initial findings in early 2010 reported five common genetic variations linked with lung function. Spurred on by this early success, Professors Tobin and Hall have developed a collaboration aimed at further understanding the genetic causes of lung disease.

The grant has enabled the development of more powerful studies to search for common genetic variants across the human genome and to investigate in detail the millions of nucleotides (chemical bases) that comprise the regions of the human genome so far linked to lung function. The research provides hope for better treatment for lung diseases such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Developing treatments is difficult because the molecular pathways affecting the health of the lung are not completely understood. It is hoped the new pathways discovered could be targeted by drugs, helping to deliver more personalised medicine.

Key to this research, Source BioScience have provided access to ultra-fast and sophisticated next generation DNA sequencing techniques. Using the latest genetics technology platforms in its stateof-the-art laboratory in Nottingham, it is one of the few companies worldwide able to do this work.

Professor Tobin says: “A large reduction in lung function occurs in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, which affects around 1 in 10 adults above the age of 40 and is the fourth most common cause of death worldwide. Smoking is the major risk factor for development of COPD. Lung function and COPD cluster within families, indicating that variations in genes also predispose individuals to reduced lung function.”

Professor Hall says: “By identifying the genes important in determining lung function, we can start to unravel the underlying mechanisms which control both lung development and lung damage. This will lead to a better understanding of diseases such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and asthma. Crucially, it could open up new opportunities to manage and treat patients with lung conditions.”

According to recently-published research by NESTA¹, collaboration improves the capacity for innovation, which is critical at a time when the biomedical industry’s R&D productivity rates continue to fall and pharma increasingly looks to external partners for its drug discovery.

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Dr Ian Barr, director of the Healthcare and Bioscience iNet says: “If the UK is going to retain its strong international position in healthcare and bioscience research, we need world-beating collaborations like this one that can attract funding from the private sector.”

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For more information contact Louise Third, Integra Communications for Healthcare and Bioscience iNet, 0115 912 4350, louise@integracommunications.co.uk 1Marston, L., All

together now: improving collaboration in the UK, NESTA, research report March 2011

P ROJ E CTS

Putting the stops on cancer growth In a joint research collaboration between Sareum, The Institute of Cancer Research, and Cancer Research UK, Checkpoint Kinase 1 (CHK1) has been targeted, which is a protein important in controlling a cancer cell’s response to DNA damage.

Pre-clinical studies carried out by Cancer Research UK show that the drug, taken by mouth and combined with chemotherapy, significantly reduces cancer growth rates compared with chemotherapy alone.

Dr Tim Mitchell, Sareum Chief Executive, said: “The selection of a preclinical development candidate is a major milestone for the collaboration that will significantly enhance the licensing package.

“Our research indicates that the selectivity and oral dosing properties of this candidate give it a competitive advantage.”

The new drug works by preventing chemo-treated cancer cells from repairing their DNA, which means it can be used to treat a wide range of cancers. Its potential to treat colon cancer, pancreatic, lung, early childhood cancer and some types of leukaemia have already been shown.

Dr Philip Masterson, Associate Director at Cancer Research Technology, said: “We are working to select the right commercial partner to take the Chk1 programme into clinical development.

Our scientists have shown that this drug is promising in pre-clinical studies, and we hope further research will prove that it can be used on its own or alongside chemotherapy and radiotherapy to destroy cancer cells in patients.”

Sareum concentrates its research on targeted small molecule therapeutics that disrupt specific biochemical processes necessary for tumour growth and survival. Because these processes are specific to cancer cells, targeted therapies

may be more effective than other types of treatments, such as chemotherapy and radiotherapy, and less harmful to normal cells. A further benefit of small molecule therapeutics is their potential to be administered orally, for instance as a pill, rather than by injection.

Founded in 2003, Sareum closed its labs after struggling in this high risk sector and became a virtual company, with scientists all over the world working on the programme. All research is now carried out in the laboratories of thirdparty providers, enabling Sareum to

access drug discovery expertise through the world with a very flexible cost base.

Sareum plan to license the Chk1 candidate drug to a big pharma company, aiming to have the drug in clinical trials within 12 months. A recent similar deal in the sector topped $700m.

For more information visit www.sareum.co.uk

2011 ISSUE 3

Sareum focus on developing best in class therapies where pre and early clinical data is available indicating that disrupting the targeted biochemical process will prevent tumour growth without significant side-effects. Whether a therapy needs to be administered in combination with additional cancer therapies is also indicated in the data.

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Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Knowledge Transfer Network HealthTech and Medicines

Building a Healthy Nation through Business Innovation

Members of HealthTech and Medicines KTN get an Innovation Boost The HealthTech and Medicines KTN supports business innovation through partnerships, funding and knowledge transfer: l Connecting partners:

Bringing together and facilitating collaborations with a common goal

l Access to funding:

Identify and influence new and existing sources of funding

l Knowledge transfer:

Opening doors to wider networks of people, organisations

Innovation depends on an intimate knowledge of a technology and close relationships with subject experts on one hand, and a breadth of contacts and an overview of the supply chain on the other.

The HealthTech and Medicines Knowledge Transfer Network is a single front door through which members can find all the expertise and support they need across the innovation chain, from first idea, to patenting and packaging intellectual property, finding academic and industrial partners for product development and manufacturing scaleup, meeting regulatory standards, and getting access to market.

The HealthTech and Medicines KTN also help members to access funding from the Technology Strategy Board for prototype development and proof of concept work.

SUMMER 2010 EDITION

Membership of the KTN provides access to a dynamic, UKwide knowledge transfer network covering all aspects of medical devices, diagnostics, and medicines. In addition, the KTN works with these communities, actively promoting sharing of knowledge, building value chains and suggesting possible collaborations and partnerships. It is also involved in developing international networks, supporting business engagement in the US, China, Japan and Europe.

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The KTN has set up specialist groups in areas including Advanced Wound Management, Assisted Living, Clinical Trials, Regenerative Medicines, Healthcare-Associated Infections and Stratified Medicines to help companies home in on the particular resources they need to address any of these areas.

www.innovateuk.org/healthktn www.innovateuk.org/healthktn

Membership of the KTN provides access to: l Potential practitioner network into industry, industry friendly academia and clinical groups l Technology Strategy Board, National and EU funding competitions l Impartial advice and access to the full KTN network l Key individuals within the community – putting you in touch with the right partners for forming collaborations l Networking opportunities and events

Led by key opinion leaders, these specialist groups bring researchers, entrepreneurs, companies, clinical and regulatory experts together to identify opportunities, flag up potential roadblocks and foster new partnerships. Backing up these meetings, the KTN’s innovation platform features online tools that enable partners to explore projects and issues they are working on together.

For more information and how to engage with the HealthTech and Medicines KTN community visit:

www.innovateuk.org/healthktn

IN BR I E F

Assisted Living Innovation Platform Showcase Event 2011 The third annual conference of the Assisted Living Innovation Platform (ALIP), which took place in Glasgow on 8 June, provided the opportunity for the diverse community that has formed around ALIP to hear about and discuss the progress of funded projects, meet up with collaboration partners, and share views about how the field is developing - and where it is heading in the future.

The delegates also heard about the Technology Strategy Board’s ambitious plan to build on the work completed to date – which has demonstrated the feasibility and value of using technology products and services to contribute to the health and social care of our ageing population – to fund a project that will demonstrate how to deliver these products and services at scale.

ALIP was set up in November 2007 with the dual purpose of helping the UK confront an unprecedented change in population

demographics and enabling the diverse range of companies and service providers that have relevant technology and expertise to get together and tap into users’ experience and requirements, as the basis for developing assisted living products.

With the programme now more than half way through, the third annual showcase illustrated the role which the HealthTech and Medicines Knowledge Transfer Network has played in providing a focus for people across the spectrum of social and healthcare to exchange ideas, advertise their capabilities and discuss technology requirements. At the same time as providing a single port of call for knowledge transfer, the Knowledge Transfer Network has been instrumental in the formation of partnerships, introducing people to each other, and helping them to access grants in Technology Strategy Board funding programmes.

Case Studies Whole Systems Demonstrator

DALLAS

One of the ambitious programmes linked and feeding into ALIP was the Whole Systems Demonstrator, which provided the world’s first randomised control trial for telecare.

Mike Biddle of Technology Strategy Board described how DALLAS will invest up to £23 million to establish three to five communities that demonstrate how assisted living technologies can be deployed at scale. The aim is to unlock new markets and show economies of scale that will fuel the growth of the market for UK companies whilst improving care.

As Tim Ellis, programme manager noted, at present over 80 per cent of contact in the NHS is face-toface – a sharp contrast with the way we interact with other services. The Whole Systems Demonstrator looked at ways to move health care to other channels without compromising the quality of care given. The underlying principle is to use technology as a means to improve the quality of information, leading the way to better decision-making by doctors, carers and families, and resulting in more personalised care.

This led the Whole system Demonstrator to investigate approaches including remote care, coaching, online advice, social networking to put people in touch with those suffering from the same condition, environmental monitoring and providing memory prompts.

The project has a substantial portfolio of experience in this area on which to draw, since the UK has a relatively high take-up, with 1.5 million receiving telecare and over

5,000 current users of telehealth services.

One critical piece of the jigsaw that the Whole Systems Demonstrator has put in place is the National Framework Agreement for Procurement of Telehealth and Telecare. This eases access to market for suppliers, who understand what is expected of them, and ensures products and services can be integrated and interoperate.

Organisations of any size from any sector can bid to take part in DALLAS. The DALLAS communities will be 100 per cent funded by the Technology Strategy Board from May 2012 to 2015, and the ambition is that the projects continue after that time because they will have become embedded and valued.

Overall, there will be two thirds of the funding of the Whole Systems Demonstrator for ten times the number of participants. This, in itself, demonstrates the extent to which ALIP has moved the whole field of assisted living forward. Mike Biddle said, “We can leverage off what has happened already; the cost of the technology has gone down and we think we are at the tipping point.”

The Whole Systems Demonstrator involved 5,830 users. While the final results are not yet available, lessons have been learned and these will feed into DALLAS and other future projection, helping to turn invention into adoption.

Technology Strategy Board Driving Innovation

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PROJ E CTS

Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Breathe again A collaborative two-year project between Swansea University’s College of Engineering and industry is helping to develop respiratory aids that mimic the performance of healthy lungs.

The project, supported by a grant through the Welsh Government’s Academic Expertise for Business (A4B) programme, will allow immobile patients with lung disease to enjoy a better quality of life.

Edwina Hart, Minister for Business, Enterprise, Technology and Science commented, “This device has the potential to have a real impact on the lives of many people while the collaboration supports local business. In the longer term, high profile projects of this calibre can help promote the capabilities of Welsh universities and research centres internationally.”

He said: “A deeper understanding of these flows is needed both to maximise the controllability of the device and to minimise the risk of blood clots forming in the device. This study has wider applications to other medical devices that contact blood.”

Professor Bill Johns of Haemair Ltd said: “This project builds on five years of fruitful collaboration between Haemair, Swansea University and Professor Adrian Evans and his colleagues at the Morriston Hospital. A successful outcome should help us ensure both the safety and effectiveness of our artificial lung.”

Dr Dale Rogers of Haemaflow Ltd said: “The work will provide an ideal test bed for the company’s novel instruments for measuring blood gases. The instruments will help the project and the project will give Haemaflow the experience to evolve designs for a wide range of potential applications in Medicine and Sports Science.”

(Left to right) Dr Dale Rogers, Senior Engineer, Haemaflow Ltd; Lindsay D’Silva, PhD student in the University’s College of of Engineering, who is taking part in a cardiovascular assessment, which forms part of the research; Dr Michael Lewis, Project Director, Swansea University College of Engineering; Dr Melitta McNarry, Project Officer; Dr Steve Brown, Senior Engineer, Haemair Ltd.

Academics from the University’s College of Engineering have joined forces with Swansea-based companies Haemair Ltd, Haemaflow Ltd, DTR Medical Ltd, and Staffordshire-based EGS Technologies Ltd.

2011 ISSUE 3

The project’s director Dr Michael Lewis, Senior Lecturer at Swansea University, said: “Lung disease is a major problem that affects a large number of people, particularly in Wales. Although Extracorporeal Life Support systems – or artificial lungs – can support immobile patients with lung disease, these devices restrict patients to high-dependency units in hospitals.

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“This innovative project aims to develop a prototype small-scale respiratory aid, which is capable of regulating blood oxygenation and carbon dioxide removal, in response to patients’ different metabolic requirements – ultimately allowing them to enjoy a better quality of life.”

The project is currently seeking generally healthy volunteers, aged between 18-58 years, to take part in the cardiovascular assessment stage of the research.

The first aim of the project is to develop an automated control system for a respiratory aid capable of modifying blood oxygenation and carbon dioxide removal, in order to meet the changing requirements of active patients.

The second aim is to study the distribution of blood flow through smallscale prototype respiratory aids.

In contrast to existing devices, the team aspires to produce a respiratory aid that does not set pre-specified blood gas compositions. Instead, this innovation will adjust gas compositions to changing metabolic demands.

Professor P Rhodri Williams leads the team from the University’s Complex Fluids group, which will study the detailed blood flow pattern within the device.

Prototype of the external respiratory aid (artificial lung), which is being developed by Haemair Ltd.

For further information, please contact Dr Melitta McNarry, Research Officer, Swansea University on 01792 513069 or email: m.mcnarry@swansea.ac.uk.

P ROD U CTS

Putting dehydration to bed Dehydration is a well-known and potentially life-threatening problem.

An adequate intake of water – 2.5 litres per day for adults - is fundamental to health and vitally important with conditions such as diabetes, ulcers and incontinence.

Hydrant named ‘Putting Dehydration to bed within the NHS’, has indicated the following impacts: l 20% reduction in length of stay l 97% reduction in recorded incidence of dehydration

Recognising dehydration as a patient issue, the national patient safety agency (PASA) together with the Royal College of Nursing developed an online advice kit for healthcare staff, yet adequate drinking within care facilities remains an on-going problem. Often the cup is out of reach, empty, or too difficult to lift, and busy nurses or carers are unable to monitor their patients’ fluid intake.

l 100% reduction in hospital acquired urinary tract infections through simply keeping patients correctly hydrated l If replicated nationally it could save the NHS £5 Billion per year Stoke Mandeville Hospital has adopted the device and Liz Evans, Nutrition Nurse Specialist, is a strong advocate:

Bristol-based Hydrate for Health has developed The Hydrant – a simple ‘hands-free’ drinking system that enables dependent patients unable to reach, lift or hold drinks on their own to regain independence.

The patented product (available in 500ml to 1 litre sizes) is a one piece with a cap, handle, a drinking tube with a bite valve, and a small clip to attach the tube to clothing if needed. The bottle is hung from the bed, chair or wheelchair; the user then drinks from a long flexible hose using the bite valve which opens under pressure and closes when released.

The graduated scale printed on the bottles enables accurate measurement of oral intake.

The company’s owner, Mark Moran, developed the idea in hospital in 2005 after a back operation. For several subsequent days Mark was bed bound with limited movement. Without a nurse he was unable to drink and coupled with a hot and dry hospital environment, dehydration was inevitable.

Over the past six years, Mark has taken the concept of easier drinking through

to successfully launching The Hydrant and Sports Hydrant into the healthcare and leisure markets. Available through the NHS supply chain, The Hydrant has been advocated by the Nursing Times.net as a ‘A simple, cost-effective device allowing patients to access water independently without having to lift a beaker or jug’.

Since commercialisation Mark has been working with the Innovative Technology Adoption Procurement Programme (iTAPP) and the Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention (QIPP)/ Safety Express programme. Currently 12 hospitals are in the early stages of full evaluations of The Hydrant, and Mark is hoping to trial the device in the community and care home markets.

“If dehydration is avoided in the community setting we will stop the flow of people to hospital in the first place,” says Mark.

The potential impacts of this device are becoming well documented. A 2009 study in an NHS hospital using The

“The Hydrant is a wonderful piece of equipment. It is easy to use, and has passed all infection control tests run by our Trust so we have no concerns at all about patient safety. It has hugely improved the quality of life for our spinal patients and as such The Hydrant should be a standard part of any hospital’s armour in the battle against dehydration.”

This simple system, advocated by users and carers, also gained the attention of Jim Easton, NHS National Director for Improvement and Efficiency and architect of the national QIPP programme. In a Keynote speech at the 2011 Healthcare Innovation Expo in London he said: “The Hydrant…potentially one of the ideas with the highest return to investment ratio I have ever seen.”

The South Central Strategic Health Authority at the same Expo calculated that, ‘Every £1 spent on The Hydrant saves £16.’

Sir Ranulph Fiennes BT, OBE and Patron of Hydrate for Health Ltd, says of The Hydrant, “Simply Brilliant. Brilliantly Simple.”

For further information visit www.hydrateforhealth.co.uk

2011 ISSUE 3

This leaves many individuals at risk from dehydration-related health problems such as constipation, kidney and liver problems, urinary tract infections, dizziness, bedsores, blood pressure instability and lethargy.

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Sunday

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

Saturday

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3

4 FP7 deadline: Health Innovation

5 Bio Wednesday, London

6 BIA Global BioLeadership Summit,

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Windsor

ABHI Regional Briefing, Birmingham Mobile Applications in Healthcare Technologies, Sheffield

World Stem Cell Summit 2011, Pasadena, USA

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10 19th Annual BioPartnering Europe, 11 Biotechnica, Germany (led by ETNA) 12 London

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SDI and UKTI: AusBioTech 2011 National Conference, Adelaide, Australia

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Healthcare Aging mission, Boston, USA

November

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UKTI & SDI Bio-Europe, Dusseldorf, Germany (led by BioPartner)

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Arab Health Exhibition & Congress 2012, Dubai

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Clinical Outsourcing, London FP7:Nanosci, Nanotech, Materials and Production Tech – CSAs 2012

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Arab Health Exhibition & Congress 2012 (medilab), Dubai

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CNS and Ageing Conference, Cambridge

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2

Tuesday

Wednesday

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Saturday

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-“MedTech Confer” Birmingham - MRC funding application deadline: Developmental Pathway Funding Scheme

9 TSB Funding close:

-Internet and things of convergence -Assessing the impact of near-patient testing MRC funding application deadline: Molecular and cellular Medicine, and Infections and Immunology: -Programme grant -Partnership grant Innovation Reception and Healthcare Business Awards Dinner, York BUI Annual Scientific Meeting: The Bladder

EHI Live, Birmingham

15 Oncology Therapeutics, Reading

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1 TSB deadline:

8 FP7 deadline: Nanosci, Nanotech,

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Wednesday

3

Bio Wednesday, London

CPhl Worldwide 2011, Frankfurt, Germany

Materials and Production Tech -Small 2012 - SMEs 2012 -Large 2012

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Tuesday

2

BioTech Showcase 2012, San Francisco, USA

Medical Devices Masterclass: routes to Market, Birmingham Wellcome Trust Deadline: -Multi-user equipment grants - Biomed resource grants eHealth and Telemedicine networking seminar, Taunton

-Sepsis I: Multi-pathogen detection and/or simple discrimination -Sepsis II: Advancing biomarker use in sepsis management

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Monday

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The Future of Medical Textiles

Raising Life Science Finance, London

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Sunday

Instrumental Analysis conference & Exhibition 2011, Beijing, China An overview of the Medical Device Amending Directive 2001/47/EC, Leeds

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Wellcome Trust Deadline: Intermediate Clinical Fellowships

January

2012 Life science event calendar

16 Medica, Dusseldorf, Germany

10 Optimising MedTech Development

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February

October

event calendar 2011 Life science Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Sunday

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

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Saturday

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Clinical Trials for non-scientists, Nottingham

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and Innovation, Bristol

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9 Valuing your Technology, Nottingham

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Biopharma and health in ageing mission, Osaka, Tokyo, Japan

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BioTuesday, Oxford

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18 Medica, Dusseldorf, Germany

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Nanotech Exhibition, Tokyo, Japan

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EU Health and Biotech Research Funding 2012 and beyond, Sheffield

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December

Virtual Companies, Oxford

Sunday

BioTuesday, London

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10th Annual BioPartnering North America, Vancouver, Canada

UK Market Conference, London MRC Application deadline: Translational stem cell research funding

FP7: ERA-NET Call 2012

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

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1 Innovation panel, Birmingham

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Genesis, London

March

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From Bench to Boardroom

MRC funding application deadline: Developmental Pathway Funding Scheme

FP7- “Factories of the Future”

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6 E-health industries and Innovation Centre, Intellect and MediWales Annual Event, Swansea

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7 MRC funding application deadline:

Populations and systems medicine, and neuroscience and mental health: -Programme grant -Partnership grant

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8 Innovation Awards Ceremony 2011, 9

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PITTCON Laboratory Science, Orlando, USA

Cardiff

BioTuesday, Oxford

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Bio-Europe Spring 2012, Dusseldorf, Germany

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*Please note, this information was provided by third parties, and although correct to the best of our knowledge, we cannot be held responsible for inaccuracies. For more information about these events and funding calls contact the event organisers, or speak to your local Medilink (contact details are on the back cover of this publication).

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31 SW iNets

Funding Close Date

GAMBICA

Medilink NW

Medilink Y&H

SDI

UKTI

BioNow

Healthtech KTN

MediWales/ WAG

OBN

SEHTA

ABHI

CCRA

Medilink EM

Medilink WM

One Nucleus

BIA

Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Listening to your heart Optima-life, specializing in technology and services for optimising health, has developed a new advanced heart rate measuring device.

Smaller than a match box, Optimalife’s Firstbeat Bodyguard technology can record up to 5 days of continuous heartbeat data, providing highly accurate heart rate and R-R interval (the inverse of heart rate) measurements.

From simply measuring a person’s heart rate and its variability, data is downloaded. The software interprets this raw data using advanced algorithms, which is translated in to an easy-tounderstand motivational report. Linked to physical activity, weight management, stress, sleep and recovery, reports are tailored to influence behaviour change.

Firstbeat Bodyguard and additional Firstbeat HEALTH software were used in a collaborative research project, carried out with Leicester NIHR Biomedical Research Unit in Cardiovascular Diseases, Glenfield Hospital, to assist in the evaluation of exercise capacity in chronic heart failure patients.

By measuring patients’ heart rate variability data over time and using advanced algorithms, physiological data was created and placed along a time line to map behaviours. This digital modelling of human physiology has influenced the understanding of factors influencing health and wellbeing, ranging from physical activity, to stress and recovery, but also enabled Optima-life to integrate both a biological and psychological approach to understanding patients.

Further applications of the technology include being used in rehabilitation

settings, monitoring exercise load during rehabilitation-based sessions in hospital. The memory life of the Firstbeat Bodyguard device also enables patients to use the monitors at home to measure and map their daily activities, including during sleep.

As the public health time bomb of obesity and chronic disease continues ticking, innovative products, as used in this collaboration, will aid in addressing the urgent need for the public to increase their levels of physical activity and adoption of healthy lifestyles.

For further information visit www.optima-life.com

Clearing the throat

2011 ISSUE 3

A Yorkshire based company, UK Medical, supplying the world’s first biodegradable oesophageal stent recently attended a global conference in the Czech Republic to discuss this revolutionary technology that will reduce costs, prevent discomfort and cut infection.

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The BD Stent, originating from UK Medical’s partner organisation Ella based in the Czech Republic, is biodegradable dissolving in 11-12 weeks, similar to that of dissolvable sutures. Normal use of the BD Stent is for treating narrowing and tightening of the oesophagus, traditionally achieved by balloon dilatation, where a balloon is inserted into the patient’s throat and inflated to dilate the oesophagus.

This often uncomfortable procedure has to be repeated each time the oesophagus contracts, causing a lot of discomfort for the patient and necessitating costly repeat admission to hospital.

The BD Stent, once positioned, maintains its integrity and radial force for 6-8 weeks.

Its dual ‘flared-end’ design reduces the risk of migration post implantation and the need for repeated balloon dilation. With reduced hospital admissions, the procedure improves patient experience and reduces costs to the NHS. UK Medical was amongst healthcare professionals from around the world discussing how one of their groundbreaking products can be used. Mr Ian Aaron, Managing Director of UK Medical, said: “After visiting this conference our team heard so much positive feedback about the BD Stent, it’s a very impressive piece of technology that provides real benefit to the patient, as well as providing long term cost savings to the NHS.”

For more information visit: www.ukmedical.com

I N BR I E F

Locking out fatal injections

War on flu has silver lining

Killing over 600 people each year in the UK, with an estimated cost to the economy of £72 billion, a silver antimicrobial technology has the potential to wipe out the deadly HINI influenza virus.

Devised by Professor Judith Hall, a former Welsh Woman of the Year, and manufactured by South Wales based Flexicare, the Hall Lock system could become commonplace in hospitals around the world.

The CE marked failsafe system consists of low-cost pieces of plastic – a series of simple colour-coded connectors - which make it impossible for substances to be mistakenly injected into the wrong part of the body.

Prof Hall was influenced by the tragic death of a patient in Wales who had air injected into a vein instead of into a nasogastric tube. There have also been fatal mistakes involving the chemotherapy drug Vincristine, where patients have died after it was wrongly injected into the spine rather than a vein.

Prof Hall, head of anaesthetics, intensive care and pain medicine at Cardiff University, came up with the idea of creating a series of unique locks while on a trip to the US a few years ago.

“One reason for drug errors in medicine is that humans make mistakes and wrong route administration is a recurrent cause of drug errors,” she said.

“We needed to stop all these wrong-route injections so I invented a series of connectors that will not fit with any other connector. There’s one shape for intravenous injections and then another, different shape for nasogastric tubes, for spinal injection and so on.”

Prof Hall added: “These are really just little plastic bits, which connect to a series of other plastic bits so they should cost less than pennies but they should save lives.”

For further information visit www.halllock.com

Dr Richard Hastings, an expert microbiologist involved with the study, commented: “These results are a breakthrough in the continued fight against the spread of flu viruses. We have shown BioCote®-containing materials can reduce numbers of viruses by over 99.9%.”

The success of this study has encouraged BioCote and the University of Warwick to explore other potential applications of the technology. The widespread application of BioCote® antiviral technology may be an additional infection control strategy to inhibit the seasonal spread of viruses responsible for influenza illness.

BioCote’s new product can be economically engineered into materials at the time of manufacture and is able to provide continuous, built-in protection against a wide range of microorganisms. Along with the virus responsible for influenza, microbes such as MRSA, E.coli and Salmonella have also been susceptible to BioCote®’s technology.

For further information visit www.biocote.com

2011 ISSUE 3

Fatal errors made when injecting drugs into patients could be eradicated by the Hall Lock system.

Independently supported by virologists at the University of Warwick, research undertaken

by Wolverhampton-based BioCote shows that laminate and polymer material treated with BioCote antimicrobial technology can eliminate the virus.

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Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Tiny exosome holds big potential With an unmet clinical need in the early diagnosis of many diseases and cancers, exosomes may have potential as successful biomarkers.

An exosome is a near-spherical biological particle between 30 and 100 nanometres (nm). Giving an idea of scale, a human hair’s diameter is approximately 80,000nm.

A consequence of their size, exosomes are virtually invisible with few technologies able to detect them.

NanoSight, a manufacturer of nanoparticle characterization technology, is planning to commercialise laboratory tests that can detect and count exosomes. Investigated by researchers at Oxford University, these bio nanoparticles are good candidate biomarkers for Pre-Eclampsia.

Produced by cells and expelled into the surrounding medium, be it blood or urine, exosomes’ function is cell intercommunication. Carrying messenger

proteins and participating in physiological processes including thrombosis and inflammation, they aid with diagnosis as disease-specific exosomes are present at raised levels in those diseases.

Jeremy Warren, Chief Executive of NanoSight explains the technology’s potential, “As exosomes emerge as a diagnostics opportunity, research has been constrained by existing characterization methodologies. The NanoSight NS500 addresses this analysis gap, with detection, speciation and quantification of these remarkable messenger particles, at sizes where conventional flow cytometry cannot go. As a consequence, NanoSight is proving to be a “must have” investigation tool, which may well lead to its employment in providing unique diagnostic capability.”

randomly driven by the motion of water molecules, and it is their speed - measured by video tracking - which indicates their size.

This platform would allow for early detection and far more effective treatment to a large number of diseases, and will help monitor treatments.

The NanoSight NS500 system creates an image of the light scatter that the particles produce. In this image, particles diffuse

For further information visit www.nanosight.com

2011 ISSUE 3

Fertility research comes to life

22

The Babraham Institute, funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), has made a breakthrough in understanding fertility.

Around 15% of couples worldwide have difficulty conceiving a child and in around 5% of cases the reasons for infertility remain elusive. To shed light on this, attention is now turning to epigenetic (heritable) changes – important regulators for many biological processes including the development of sperm and eggs.

This research, in collaboration with the National Institute for Child Health and Development in Tokyo, looks at how mammalian genomes are modified in the egg and sperm and are reprogrammed after fertilisation.

At the heart of embryonic reprogramming are chemical changes (methylation) to the genome, which influence gene expression without altering the genetic sequence, yet can be inherited. If these ‘epigenetic’ methylation marks are not copied correctly from the egg and sperm in the developing embryo, human disorders can occur.

The research, reported in the August edition of the Nature Genetics journal, details the first genome-wide methylation map of mammalian oocytes (eggs).

Dr Gavin Kelsey, Group Leader at the Babraham Institute, explained, “A greater understanding of how methylation landscapes are set up has far reaching implications not only for understanding mechanisms of inheritance and development but also our susceptibility to age-related diseases since conditions like heart disease, diabetes and

obesity may be associated with errors in epigenetic regulation.”

The research also brings new understanding of ‘genomic imprinting’, a process where particular genes are used depending on whether they come from the mother or father. If one copy of a gene is epigenetically ‘turned off ’ and the remaining working gene has a mutation, problems may arise.

Some imprinting diseases have been reported in humans born after the use of Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART), for example a loss of methylation of the mother’s copy of a certain gene leads to Beckwith-Wiedemann syndrome, an over-growth disorder with a higher risk of developing childhood cancer.

Consequently understanding more about the methylation landscape of mammalian eggs and early embryos may help inform strategies for assisting with human reproduction and may lead to new possibilities in pre-implantation genetic diagnosis.

For further information visit www.babraham.ac.uk

I N BR I E F

Ceramics crack medical market A consortia led by Ceram has successfully secured funding from the latest ‘Technology inspired collaborative R&D’ competition run by the Technology Strategy Board.

The funding will enable the consortia team, also including Loughborough University, MEL Chemicals and Morgan Technical Ceramics, to research how nanotechnology patented

by Loughborough University can be applied to ceramics in order to make it a viable material for use in healthcare applications.

The consortia team joined over 150 other British companies and further education institutions to share £18 million of government investment made through the Technology Strategy Board to fund 43 major R&D projects that will further develop enabling technologies within Advanced Materials, Biosciences, Electronics, Photonics and Electrical Systems, High Value Manufacturing, ICT and Nanotechnology.

Ceram Business Development Manager for Medical Devices, Dr. Philip

Jackson comments: “This latest project has evolved on the back of an existing collaborative project between Ceram, Loughborough University and MEL Chemicals which looked at the application of nanotechnology within the advanced electronics and structural ceramics market.

Successful outcomes within this research project led us to believe that we could generate ceramic materials that could be used in the medical sector for hip replacements. Through retaining nanograin sizes in sintered ceramic structures, it has been shown that the unwanted

process of hydrothermal ageing can be greatly reduced. This finding has the potential to deliver ceramic implants with longer durability – invaluable in an ageing population. “Ceramics already offer significant benefits over metal and polymer hip implants, in that they generate wear debris at a much slower rate.

The consortia team are looking forward to kicking-off this new research strand in September 2011; we believe significant breakthroughs can be delivered across the life of the three-year R&D project.”

For further information visit www.ceram.com

Rising stars look North Run by early-stage venture capital firm SPARK Impact, the investment is part of the £185 million evergreen fund provided by the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) to supply debt and equity funding to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the northwest of England.

The support, initially £50,000 with potential for a further £200,000, will enable these companies to develop and reach their target market quicker.

Aventé Medical Products (AMP) plans to develop a range of single-use medical

devices, using the funding for intellectual property protection, a market survey and finalising product design.

To lease or buy power tools for orthopaedic, thoracic and spinal surgery requires high initial investment with expensive servicing and warranty arrangements. The added risks of cross infection and the inconvenience of lost items, make AMP confident its high quality, single-use power tools can ensure the right tool for the procedure is always to hand, eliminating any delays.

Based on typical costs for initial purchase, plus service contracts and the continual reprocessing of reusable tools over a three year period, their product solution could offer a saving of around £250 per surgical

procedure, with annual savings running into millions of pounds for the NHS. Future Medical Technologies has developed polymeric hydrogels to mimic human cartilage for the treatment of arthritis diseases and focal defects in articulating joints, thus improving patient care. The firm will use the investment to speed up development of its HydraCartilage technology and gain regulatory approvals.

This technology has the potential to move procedures into day surgery – more efficient than current treatment. Postoperative costs will be reduced with less physiotherapy, dressings and specialised footwear required.

For more information visit www.thenorthwestfund.co.uk/funds/biomedical

2011 ISSUE 3

Two North West start-up businesses, Aventé Medical Products Limited and Future Medical Technologies, have been awarded funding by the North West Biomedical Fund.

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Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Sea change for silver surfing Staying in touch with elderly relatives in care homes is increasingly difficult due to the barriers created by modern work patterns. A unique and secure online communication service has been piloted with the residents of three East Midlands’ care homes as an easy-to-use means to communicate with their families.

New touch for appointments

The Finerday.com pilots, now being rolled out across the UK, enable family members to share messages, photos, videos and store personal information. This free-to-use facility provides a portal that allows people to live independently for longer, combining formal stakeholders and informal carers in “shared care” online.

Finerday founder Lilla Harris, a long-standing nurse and care home worker, spotted the need to keep younger and older generations connected as families become more fragmented.

“We have designed an online alternative which allows the younger generation to show Grandma just how to get e-connected. Once they get the hang of it, you can see the sheer joy that the regular sharing of photos and messages can bring to everyone” says Lilla.

According to Race Online 2012, 6 million older people currently don’t use the internet, with around 450,000 living in care homes and far more living in housing schemes. The Go ON Adopt a Care Home initiative, also inspired by Lilla, aims to improve these statistics by utilising the skills of young digital champions.

It encourages every UK school to “adopt” a local care home or sheltered housing scheme, to help engage residents in the world of the web.

Ed Vazey MP, Minister for Culture, Communications and Creative Industries says of the project: “I’m delighted to welcome the launch of the Go ON Adopt initiative - connecting schools, young people, businesses and volunteers will help create a sustainable, Big Society initiative which will reduce isolation for older people and improve their quality of life.”

Looking forward, the portal – designed to work on any device whether the PC, touchscreen or TV - will deliver low-cost teleheath monitoring solutions; personalised healthcare content; and is becoming recognised as a potential platform for assisted living.

Savience Ltd, a software development company, has secured new contracts with the NHS and its largest software IT suppliers following the launch of Savience Assure.

This integrated clinic management product package aims to streamline the appointment process at NHS outpatients’ clinics, in order to save resources and improve the patient experience.

Missed appointments cost the NHS more than £600m a year the cost of running two medium sized hospitals. For the tens of thousands of people attending UK clinics daily, unforeseen events such as an influx of caseloads can cause delays, frustrations, and consume valuable resources.

Recognising the gap in the market, Savience’s technology calls patients for appointments, enables self-check in through touchscreens, and guides patients to clinics. Staff are alerted to developing bottlenecks and longer term planning is assisted because system inefficiencies are highlighted. The appointment database can be integrated with existing hospital IT infrastructure, such as the local Patient Administration System (PAS), enabling the automation of patient outcome forms and billing, allowing hospitals to recover revenue. An additional module enables patient feedback through the public access terminals and handheld devices such as iPads.

Roger Everitt, Managing Director of Savience, outlined the company’s touchscreen technology, “The user responds to simple questions…by asking for date of birth, we can be sure that any patients with similar names can be correctly identified. Patient information then automatically links into the appointment database for the day.

2011 ISSUE 3

Lilla Harris showing Lord Erroll Finerday.com with the help of an elderly user

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For further information visit www.finerday.com and www.go-onadopt.com

“In the background, the patient’s input on touchscreens triggers the clinic management database which holds basic information about the patient and the clinics that they are due to attend.

News of their arrival is thereby available to relevant hospital staff and consultants. Their information is also linked to the Patient Administration System that every hospital maintains, thus providing seamless yet highly secured information about the patient.”

For further information visit www.savience.com

IN BR I E F

Lab for hire A new concept in the pharmaceutical field – ‘Lab Time Share’ – developed by Yorkshire based Agenda 1 Analytical Services, provides companies with flexible ways to access expertise, lab space, high end equipment and qualified staff.

laboratory based business. Initially the Lab Time Share scheme provided Kuecept with a fast route to market, allowing us to focus our efforts on our core business needs whilst still providing a top-class service to our clients.”

Lab Time Share supports start up pharmaceutical businesses and global organisations, by ensuring a company’s investment is spent on what’s most important – developing new products and technology. Customers’ direct control over their processes can be adjusted to suit their needs, ensuring the approach remains flexible and cost efficient.

Agenda 1 also have segregated lab facilities, allowing both staff and processes to be isolated when required, often an important element in analytical testing labs.

Kuecept, a drug development company from South Wales, uses Agenda1’s facilities to apply new drug delivery technology to help clients progress their products into clinic, working with applications such as

nano-particles, amorphous materials and drug solubisation technologies.

Speaking about Agenda 1’s facilities, Dr Mark Saunders - Development Director at Kuecept, said: “Setting up dedicated lab space is very time consuming and comes with significant overheads. This can often be a rate limiting step for anyone wanting to set up a new

Managing Director of Agenda 1, Ian Siragher, said: “Our aim is to facilitate the pharmaceutical process in whatever way works for our customers, whether this be working alongside development scientists or engineers or handling the entire process ourselves, we can swiftly and accurately provide the appropriate data required and guide a company to the next level.”

For further information visit www.agenda1.co.uk

Medical Technology Regulatory Affairs MSc

Excellence in Device and Packaging Testing

In today’s competitive and highly regulated healthcare environment, it is essential for companies to bring new products to the market quickly – and to keep them on the market. Excellence in managing regulatory issues is therefore a key strategic advantage to healthcare companies.

In collaboration with TOPRA, Cranfield University have developed an MSc in Medical Technology Regulatory Affairs – providing for the first time, a recognised way for regulatory affairs professionals to formalise their skills in the field of medical technology.

t +44 (0)8454 588924 f +44 (0)1303 813952 e solutions@met.uk.com www.met.uk.com Medical Engineering Technologies Ltd • Yew Tree Studios, Stone Street, Stanford North, Ashford, Kent TN25 6DH, UK

Forthcoming short courses: • Principles of European Medical Technology Regulatory Affairs 4 – 6 October • Design, Development and Testing of Medical Technology 13 – 15 December

T: +44 (0)1234 758008 W: www.cranfield.ac.uk/health/ls Visit us on our next Open Day 16 November

2011 ISSUE 3

This unique part-time MSc is designed to be flexible in order to fit around your current job and responsibilities. The course consists of eight modules, an integrated portfolio and an individual research project. For professionals with a specific interest, individual modules can be attended as stand-alone three-day short courses.

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I N BR I E F

Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

Medilink UK opens Brazilian ties

Medilink UK’s International Executive, Kevin Kiely, signing the MOU with ABIMO’s President, Ruy Baumer at Hospitalar 2011

Strengthening the relationship between Brazil and the UK, two healthcare organisations signed a memorandum of understanding in May 2011, entering a long term partnership in trade, technology and R&D. Medilink UK and ABIMO signed the agreement at HOSPITALAR – the largest healthcare trade fair in Latin America taking place in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Medilink UK is the leading healthcare organisation in the UK working with businesses, academics and clinicians to grow the UK Life Sciences industry in the UK and overseas.

ABIMO – Brazilian Association of Industries of Medical, Dental, Hospital and Laboratories Devices and Equipments –aims to strengthen, organise and regulate the health sector, both in Brazil and overseas.

International Executive of Medilink UK, Kevin Kiely, was at HOSPITALAR with twelve companies from across the UK, showcasing their world-leading products on the UK pavilion.

Speaking about the agreement, he said: “The challenges facing healthcare delivery of an ageing population and the increased prevalence of long term chronic disease are similar across the world and the partnership with ABIMO in Brazil offers a significant

opportunity to work together for the mutual benefit of manufacturing companies and enhanced patient care.

“Brazil is the UK’s most important trading partner in Latin America, with the largest healthcare market in the region, and with medical device imports totalling around £350 million each year, the country offers UK companies real opportunities.”

The partnership will enable new business to emerge within each country and provide the necessary assistance to develop partnerships, overcome inter-country barriers, and allow the introduction of new products, technologies and R&D projects between the UK and Brazil.

For further information: Peter Wheeler, Senior International Coordinator at Medilink Y&H / UKTI Email: p.wheeler@medilink.co.uk Web: www.medilink.co.uk

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Spring/Summer 2010 Issue 1

It pays to pull together

MedilinkUK

working together to raise the profile of the life science industry in the United Kingdom UK Lifescience Industry Magazine Partners

Medilink UK Partners BioBusinessNI The Innovation Centre Northern Ireland Science Park Queen’s Road Queen’s Island Belfast BT3 9DT Tel: 02890 737947 Web: www.biobusinessni.org Medilink East Midlands BioCity Nottingham Pennyfoot Street Nottingham NG1 1GF Tel: 0115 912 4330 Fax: 0115 912 4331 Web: www.medilinkem.com Medilink North West 36 Greenheys Manchester Science Park Pencroft Way Manchester M15 6JJ Tel: 0161 660 9482 Fax: 0161 660 9484 Email: enquiries@medilinknw.co.uk Web: www.medilinknw.co.uk Medilink West Midlands 4 Greenfield Crescent Edgbaston Birmingham B15 3BE Tel: 0121 452 5630 Fax: 0121 454 2325 Email: enquiries@MedilinkWM.co.uk Web: www.medilinkWM.co.uk

Other Partner Organisations MediWales 7 Schooner Way Atlantic Wharf Cardiff CF10 4DZ Tel/fax: 029 2047 3456 Email: debbie.laubach@mediwales.com Web: www.mediwales.com Medilink Yorkshire & Humber 3 Smithy Wood Drive Smithy Wood Business Park Sheffield S35 1QN Tel: 0114 232 9292 Fax: 0114 245 6820 Email: connect@medilink.co.uk Web: www.medilink.co.uk SEHTA South East Health Technologies Alliance 71 Portsmouth Road Cobham Surrey KT11 1JH Tel: 0845 130 8179 Fax: 0845 345 1682 Email: info@sehta.co.uk Web: www.sehta.co.uk

One Nucleus The Portway Granta Park Cambridge CB21 6GS Tel: 01223 896450 Fax: 01223 896471 Email: info@onenucleus.com web: www.onenucleus.com iNets South West Biomedical iNet Hub University of the West of England 2P50/51, Coldharbour Lane Bristol BS16 1QY Tel: 0117 3286691 email: biomedical@inets-sw.co.uk web: www.inets-sw.co.uk/biomedical ABHI 111 Westminster Bridge Road London SE1 7HR Tel: 020 7960 4360 Fax: 020 7960 4361 Email: enquiries@abhi.org.uk Web: www.abhi.org.uk

www.medilinkuk.co.uk