|
Med-tech zones set to boost business growth prospects for start-up enterprises: M Balasubramaniam
|
|
Nandita Vijay, Bengaluru
November 02 , 2017
|
|
|
Med-tech zones in the country are set to boost business growth prospects
for start-up companies engaged in designing and developing critical
healthcare equipment, said M Balasubramaniam, president and CEO, CURA
Healthcare.
The company was one among the participants at the
launch of the Andhra Pradesh MedTech Zone (AMTZ) which is India’s first
medical devices manufacturing unit spread over 270 acre in
Visakhapatnam. “In fact we have taken a facility here for
manufacturing,” he added.
In sync with the Union government’s
Make in India programme, CURA Healthcare went on to manufacture Illumina
3600 which is the world’s first-ever robotic 360 degree Breast
Thermography system. Many companies from India and multinational
companies have taken advantage of it to Make in India. We are one such
company that well entrenched into it and would welcome more enterprises
to be part of it, Balasubramaniam told Pharmabiz in an email.
Local
manufacture drives economies-of-scale, creates jobs, provides control
over supply chain and enables cost competitiveness. “We have been making
tremendous progress over the years. It has taken about 7 years to
develop this product. This is a solution designed, developed and
manufactured 100% by CURA Healthcare. There is no technology transfer
from any country. The camera component is imported and tuned for
illumina. The final product is priced around Rs. 30 lakh to Rs. 35 lakh similar to that of an analog mammography system.
In
this advanced robot, the protocol is set to allow maximum comfort to
patients. There is also an environmental control system that allows dual
temperature studies identifying changes during mild hot and cold
conditions. There are drawbacks in the equipment manufactured abroad
like only few images can taken and the chances of failing to spot key
tissues is high. To offset the same, we have developed advanced
algorithms that aid the physician to auto-detect a cancerous tissue
early or compare with historical exams and compare with other images for
correlation, he explained.
“The way forward is to scout for
tie-ups with government hospitals and talks are underway. With illumina
being funded by the Union government, we believe this can disrupt the
way breast health is being managed today. As a Make in India effort and
as a for India product, clinical trials were done on over 10,000
patients across 6 institutions. The final analysis is that our Breast
Thermography system is shown to be 97% accurate and can find tissues
below 2 mm size. It is a complementary technology for mammography and
other structural imaging tools,” he said.
Going by the morbidity
and mortality of breast cancer in the world, the company is keen to
ensure that patients globally can benefit from early detection and
radiation free screening, said Balasubramaniam.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
TOPICS
|
That foods might provide therapeutic benefits is clearly not a new concept. ...
|
|
|
|
|