Description

Rockland Technimed Ltd. (RTL) is engaged in the development of a Tissue Viability Imaging Contrast Media for use with Magnetic Resonance Imaging.

Products/Services

Rockland Technimed's patented Tissue Viability Imaging Agent offers a tool to assess the quality and function of injured tissue. It can differentiate between reversible or irreversible ischemia.

Technology

The company's Oxy-17 is formulated using a stable, non-radioactive isotope of Oxygen that can be used to detect hypoxic, but still viable tissue. After Oxy-17 is absorbed by the cell and converted to water it perturbs the proton signal and creates a negative contrast on T2 weighted MR images. Oxygen-starved or hypoxic tissue consumes a larger percentage of oxygen than normal tissue, and will extract higher concentrations of Oxy-17, differentiating viable tissue from nonviable necrotic tissue which does not extract Oxy-17.

Market/Customers

The total market potential for Oxy-17 is estimated to be more than $1 billion. An estimated 5 million people world-wide are afflicted with strokes each year. If neurologists prescribe two (2) Oxy17 scans each for only 30% of the US and European patients, it would be over 1 million scans per year. At an average sales price of $1,000/scan, sales would exceed $1 billion for this first application alone. Research to date suggests that the improved diagnosis of viable tissue up to 12 hours with Oxy17 would result in its use being prescribed for a majority of stroke patients.

Status

Rockland believes that Oxy-17 may prove useful for imaging areas of hypoxia in cases of myocardial ischemia, stroke, and abdominal visceral ischemic injury. Other potential uses for future investigation include mapping the epicenter in epilepsy, categorizing tumor oxygenation, cancer staging, and assessing the efficacy of radiation and chemotherapy. The company's target customers are hospitals, HMO's, PPO's and free standing imaging clinics. The potential to increase the overall demand for diagnostic, preventive and follow-up screening is significant in this latent application sector. Rockland will use strategic marketing partners to satisfy this demand.