CW Optics Announces Clinical Trial of Breakthrough Technology for Wound Imaging for Diabetics

Seaford, VA, August 27, 2010 --(PR.com)-- CW Optics, Inc. announced today a clinical trial at Richmond's Chippenham and Johnston-Willis (CJW) Medical Center to investigate the safety and efficacy of WoundImager®, an advanced optical imaging device for monitoring the effectiveness of therapeutic management of chronic wounds caused by diabetes.

Diabetics often develop chronic, nonhealing wounds, especially on their lower legs and feet. As many as 10% of all diabetics - about 1.6 million Americans - have chronic wounds, resulting in extreme pain, tissue damage, nerve damage, or amputation of the affected limb.

Hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) is a common treatment for wound healing, requiring 20 sessions of 90-min each. During treatment, the patient is enclosed in a hyperbaric chamber, under 2-3 atmospheres of oxygen. The increased pressure and oxygen improve blood flow and promote wound healing. An important factor in wound management is the ability to assess health conditions of the wound site. The WoundImager® applies CW Optics' patented laser speckle imaging (LSI) technology to measure blood flow velocity of wound sites.

During the clinical trials, the WoundImager® will be used to monitor the healing process of chronic foot wounds of two groups of patients, patients who are undergoing HBOT and patients who receive standard wound care only. Joseph Boykin, Jr., MD, FACS, Medical Director of CJW Wound Healing Center and Clinical Associate Professor of Plastic Surgery at Virginia Commonwealth University, is the clinical principal investigator on this project.

Dr. Boykin said, "Emerging research in wound healing suggests that clinical correlation of skin and wound blood flow with biomarkers of healing may provide new surrogate endpoints for wounds managed with HBOT. LSI technology has the potential to provide this diagnostic link for quantitative wound assessment that may establish a new benchmark for wounds treated with HBOT."

The WoundImager® can be used to monitor other wounds, such as the wound in the mouth of oral cancer patients, transplanted flaps of patients undergoing flap-transfer surgeries.

This trial is supported by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute under grant R44HL059807.

More information on this trial can be found at http://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01139567 and http://www.woundimager.com/.

CW Optics is a privately-held technology company specializing in design and development of biophotonic devices for clinically important human physiological monitoring. CW Optics’ product pipeline is focused on noninvasive, optical diagnostic technologies based on complex photon scattering analysis - the technical expertise of the founders. Employment opportunities are available at CW Optics, see http://www.cwoptics.com/blog.

###
Contact
CW Optics, Inc.
Nee-Yin Chou
757 872 4000
www.cwoptics.com
ContactContact
Categories