Advanced Catheter Therapies, Inc. (ACT) has announced that the United States Patent and Trademark Office has issued U.S. Patent No. 8398589 B2 for its catheter technology. ACT is a research and development medical device company with a portfolio of innovative catheter technologies initially targeting vascular disease and restenosis.
This is the company’s third patent for its Occlusion Perfusion Catheter (OPC). The OPC is a multi-lumen balloon catheter designed to temporarily occlude a specific region from blood flow to allow the local delivery of therapeutic agents to the peripheral and eventually the coronary vasculature. The device has the ability to create a localized treatment chamber for the delivery of various types of therapeutic agents to treat a variety of disease states and place the agent circumferentially into the vasculature of the treatment chamber.
The OPC is unique in its ability to measure pressure applied inside the treatment chamber and its inflow and outflow ports for chamber evacuation, filling and flushing. It affords clinicians substantial procedural control and the ability to select the treatment agent and volume along with significantly limiting systemic release of the treatment agent.
“This is an important advance for us,” said Paul J. Fitzpatrick, CEO of ACT. “We already have utility patent protection for the OPC, and this protects the intellectual property with a method patent. We continue to move steadily forward towards the sale or out-license of the OPC, and have filed for 510(k) market clearance from the FDA. We strongly feel the OPC is positioned to be the next generation of therapeutic agent delivery devices.”
ACT recently announced it is in the process of raising $3 million in Series B preferred equity financing and has already obtained a portion of that amount. In 2011, the company raised a total of $2.98 million in Series A equity financing through an investment consortium in Chattanooga, TN.
ACT operates as a highly efficient research and development organization, developing its product line through a phased approach. The company’s role in product development includes design, IP patent filing, engineering, working prototyping, testing and regulatory approvals. Once the device is ready for human trials and/or manufacturing, sales and distribution, ACT will out-license or sell each device technology to a strategic partner.
