Building a Better Stop-Gap: Vascular Access for Dialysis
This article was originally published in Start Up
Executive Summary
Ask any group of nephrologists what the biggest problem is in hemodialysis today and most likely they'll say vascular access. Vasca Inc. believes this is just the sort of problem that technology can address. The young company hopes to convince a fragmented group of physicians that its subcutaneous valve that bridges patients to the optimal, but less used, permanent type of access option, the arteriovenous fistula, will provide clinical and costs benefits across the continuum of dialysis therapy.
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Dialysis prolongs the lives of patients with end-stage renal disease, but outcomes are still poor, with a 17% mortality rate in the US. Nephrologists and technology developers want to improve outcomes, but the economics of dialysis have stymied innovation. Medicare tightly controls pricing, and developers are hard-pressed to find therapies that increase clinical benefits but not cost. Recently, two major clinical trials in dialysis hint that the benefits of dialysis, as it's currently performed, are approaching their limits. Start-ups now have the ammunition with which to approach a technologically stagnant market. Small companies, however, face daunting competition: three giant players dominate the market, two of which own 40% of the service centers that provide dialysis therapies.
Biolink Corp.
Biolink is developing a vascular access port for hemodialysis.
VascA Inc.
Vascular access has been the weakest link in the chain of dialysis therapy. But VascA hopes to be the first to market with a subcutaneous access port for dialysis.