Innercool Therapies Inc.
This article was originally published in Start Up
Executive Summary
[Innercool Therapies Inc.] believes it can offer a fast, effective, and safe way to provide hypothermic therapy with {Celsius Control}, its vascular catheter system for inducing or reversing hypothermia in the treatment of various conditions. Innercool's system consists of a proprietary disposable catheter tip made of a flexible metal and a portable device that supplies temperature-controlled saline to the catheter. The catheter is placed in the blood stream and exchanges heat directly with the blood to provide a warming or cooling effect. There is no need to perfuse fluids into the body or to circulate blood outside of the body.
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Philips buys Innercool: The Ice Age Cometh
As part of a bid to connect the dots between its own product offerings, Philips Healthcare acquired InnerCool Therapies, maker of surface and endovascular cooling devices for the management of cardiac patients. InnerCool fits into the company's broader "care cycle" strategy, the point of which is to provide a continuum of care to patients in the diseases Philips serves. Specifically, Philips' strategy is to connect diverse care settings to its product markets, in this case, cardiac resuscitation. The combination marks a change in how sudden cardiac arrest is regarded, from an isolated episode focused on a stopped heart to a larger strategy of patient management.
Temperature Management Devices Are Hot
Doctors have long theorized that being able to precisely warm (hyperthermia) and cool (hypothermia) patients, depending on their conditions and surroundings, would be beneficial in a variety of neurological and cardiovascular procedures. This has given rise to a group of medical device companies formed in the mid-to-late 1990s dedicated to developing temperature management systems. The big question has ben whether clinical data would validate the bets these companies made in this space. Early clinical data released recently has been positive, and large companies are interested in this area, sparking the first major temperature management deal.