Remedium Technologies

R. Adams Cowley, the doctor considered the father of trauma medicine, popularized the phrase “Golden Hour” to describe the first 60 minutes following a critical injury. Severe injuries are usually accompanied by hemorrhage, a large loss of blood from the site of the wound. Effectively controlling bleeding within the “Golden Hour” can mean the difference between life and death.

There are a large number of products on the market aimed at the treatment of bleeding injuries. However, these products tend to be either too costly, too ineffective, or both.

Using a new patent-pending platform technology that greatly enhances the ability of a known wound care material, chitosan, Remedium Technologies is creating versatile, inexpensive, effective products capable of stopping bleeding resulting from injury, illness or surgery, particularly for situations in which traditional solutions are impractical or unavailable.

Remedium Technologies' research and products have been receiving national attention for their innovation and potential to save lives.

Dangerous Bleeding

In the battlefield, severe injury accompanied by hemorrhage is a stark reality. Hemorrhage resulting from severe limb injuries accounts for nearly 10% of all deaths on the battlefield—more than half of which could be prevented if there existed an effective treatment to quickly stop the bleeding. In addition to the 21 million patients worldwide who experience severe trauma each year, 97 million patients experience bleeding during surgery. This can be a major complication for diabetics, smokers, hemophilics, patients with liver and kidney disease, and the elderly. Cauterization and suturing, the two most common ways of dealing with surgical bleeding, are often impractical and uncomfortable for these patients.

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Chitosan: A Natural Solution

Currently, there are a variety of products designed to serve as hemostatic agents that can stop the discharge of blood from a wound. Some of these are made with chitosan, an amino-polysaccharide derived from chitin, an abundant natural biopolymer found in the shells of crustaceans such as crabs and shrimp.

The amines on chitosan become protonated at slightly acidic pH, thereby imparting a positive charge to chitosan chains. Chitosan was chosen as a hemostatic agent presumably because of its cationic nature: since most biological cell surfaces are anionic, it was believed that chitosan could strongly adhere to the tissue at the site of a wound through electrostatic interactions. In addition, chitosan also has anti-microbial properties, which helps prevent infection at the wound site.

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Current Challenges

Despite the advantages, existing hemostatic products have some key drawbacks. Studies have found that while at least one chitosan-based dressing was capable of stopping severe bleeding soon after being applied, it became saturated and failed within 2 hours because the adhesion between the dressing and the patient's tissue weakened as the dressing became soaked with blood.

There are a fewother current products available that are able to effectively stop bleeding for a longer period of time; however, these are typically based on purified proteins like fibrin and thrombin, which are very costly and in short supply.

There is a clear need for an wound dressing that is cheap, extremely effective at stopping bleeding, and adheres strongly to the wound site for extended periods of time.

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Remedium's Solution and Products

Surgery Remedium is developing a chitosan-based material that is able to adhere to tissue in a very effective manner. The backbone of chitosan is functionalized with simple fatty grafts that insert themselves into cell bilayers via self-assembly. These fatty grafts act as nano-“hooks” for blood and soft tissue, resulting in significantly enhanced tissue adhesion and blood coagulation ability. The “hooks” allow for reversible Velcro-like interaction between chitosan and blood/tissue; hence, the moniker “Nano-Velcro.”

We can use this “Nano-velcro” because the key biomaterial-tissue interaction occurs at the nanoscale. This is a “brave new world” of functionality for trauma surgeons as they will be able to control bleeding from multiple tissues in the patient while they work step-wise, adding and removing the Nano-Velcro when desired. Also, flowable liquids consisting of this modified chitosan can be applied as a spray to quickly stop minor bleeding during surgery, and seal soft tissue from exudation and microbial invasion. This biopolymer modification is very inexpensive and simple, yet it is a potentially revolutionary platform for a improving a wide range of polymer-based materials used for treating severe hemorrhage and surgical bleeding.

Remedium's products have shown promising initial results for treatment of injuries ranging from minor surgical bleeding to life-threatening arterial punctures. We are currently developing two products: a surgical spray and a sponge.

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Remedium Staff

Matt Dowling, CEO (e-mail)
Tosin Ogunsola, Ph.D., CMO
Peter Thomas, CTO

Bani Cipriano, Ph.D., Scientific Advisor
Chao Zhu, Ph.D. , Scientific Advisor
Akinola Donsunmu, M.B.A., Business Advisor
Don Wood, M.B.A., Business Advisor