An innovative medical device which supports wound healing with oxygen is gaining worldwide traction.
Craig Kennedy, CEO of NATROX庐 Wound Care – an Inotec AMD brand – says its is primed to go truly global after 鈥渇ive years of prep work鈥�.
He explained how the Cambridge University spinout鈥檚 tech works to 老九品茶Cloud earlier this year. In the intervening months, he says the product has begun to fly.
鈥淚n the US we’re waiting for our national reimbursement to be awarded. We expect that to happen in the next several months. So we’re very excited in preparing for that,鈥� Kennedy tells us.
鈥淭he Veterans Association in the US is really coming around. That’s been fantastic. We’ve also seen some movement on our reimbursement requests in countries like Colombia and Korea. Plus we’ve recently applied for reimbursement in South Africa.
鈥淥ur goal is always to get to as many patients as possible that could use our product.鈥�
The device, which is smaller than an iPhone, uses oxygen to stimulate healing. Designed to help heal chronic wounds, it generates and delivers continuous topical oxygen therapy (cTOT) to patients while being non-invasive and comfortable.
Already available on the NHS, the lightweight wearable gives patients complete freedom of movement, allowing them to get back to their normal lives while treating their hard-to-heal wounds.
Asia
Kennedy sees a particular opportunity in Asia. 鈥淭here’s just not that many primary care options for people to go to other than the public hospital,鈥� he explains. 鈥淲e wanted to change that so we are launching a new product there called NATROX庐 Wound Solutions.
鈥淚t provides all of the necessary wound care services to a primary care facility with the goal of increasing their patient volume: we give people the entire toolbox, all the way from training to products to diagnostics to management of wounds.
鈥淚f someone’s interested in adding wound care to their service portfolio, they come to us and we give them everything they need. They have one invoice to issue to get everything – all of the diagnostic equipment, the products.
鈥淲e also have an oversight programme so that anytime they feel they have a patient that they may be out of their scope of knowledge with, they can ‘phone a friend’ – we have local wound care experts and international experts that can help them with that patient. Together, we can bridge the gap and reach patients in need.
鈥淲e’ve sold our first subscription there and we’ve got two other proposals outstanding.鈥�
Inotec 鈥� NATROX庐 O鈧� device heals wounds with humidified oxygen
Top team
Expansion in the region – which will also take in Vietnam, Singapore and Malaysia – will be supported by a team and .
Kennedy says NATROX庐 Wound Care doubled its office and production space at its Cambridge HQ last year and plans to double it again in the next few months. 鈥淒emand will outweigh our current capacity by the end of this year,鈥� he adds.
The firm, which topped our MedTech 50 ranking again this year, now employs approaching 35 people globally. 鈥淲e have phenomenal people running all aspects of the business. They do an amazing job of knowing their customers, knowing what needs to be done and putting the time and effort in to be successful,鈥� he says.
鈥淚 put our team up against anybody because they’re seasoned and they’re motivated.鈥�
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He says names such as 鈥渃ould work for any company anywhere in the world鈥�.
鈥淭hey choose to work with us because they believe in the product. They鈥檙e passionate and motivated to make a real impact. You don’t get a chance to make a big difference in an industry very often in a career – and when you do, it’s fun.鈥�
Manufacturing of the NATROX庐 O鈧� device has been brought in-house to guard against supply chain issues and ensure quality.
Kennedy, a keen long-distance runner, likens the rapid progress this year to 鈥渢he final two miles of a marathon鈥�, adding: 鈥淲hen opportunity presents itself, you gotta be the first to the party. This part’s been a sprint!
鈥淧ost-COVID we saw an opportunity. If I’m honest, it took a little bit of time for us to put together all of the pieces鈥� to understand what we really needed to get to where we wanted to be.聽
鈥淚t was an evolution, probably about 12 to 18 months, that all came together and solidified early this year: this is what the product offering looks like; these are the customers that would be most interested; tweaking our message and the product; and finally making the relationships we needed to have a viable product.鈥�
Clinical
He says awareness of the product has been driven by its focus on collecting clinical data.
鈥淎s we get closer to reimbursement in the US, we’ll build up our public awareness because the product will be more readily available. We’ve already done more and more awareness in the VA (the Veterans Affairs Group).
鈥淭here’s a lot of ways you can get notoriety – you can shout from the mountaintops and have flashy websites, but if you don’t have clinical evidence and you don’t have proof, none of it makes any sense. We started with the clinical evidence and let it talk for us.
鈥淲hen we went to our first big wound care conference in Las Vegas in 2018, we sat at the booth – me and one other person – and people walked by us, kind of snickered and kept walking. No one knew who we were, no one believed in oxygen, no one believed that what we were doing was going to go anywhere.
鈥淵et at the same show this year – held in Washington DC – we had five people manning the booth and people three- or four-deep all day long wanting to see it. The awareness is now there – all because of the clinical evidence.聽
鈥淲e鈥檝e come a long way. When we talk to clinicians now, they鈥檝e heard of us. The momentum is building: we’re on the cusp of going global. It’s an exciting time not just for us, but for patients everywhere.鈥�