Yale Technology Spins Out Varicose Vein Device Company: Vascular Insights, LLC

Main Category: Vascular
Also Included In: Medical Devices / Diagnostics
Article Date: 10 Apr 2006 - 13:00 PST


A new company, Vascular Insights, LLC, was founded to develop, manufacture and market devices to treat varicose vein disease, based on technology invented by Michael Tal, M.D., assistant professor of diagnostic radiology (http://radiology.yale.edu/) and director of research interventional radiology at Yale University School of Medicine.

"While varicose vein disease is normally not a life threatening condition, it can cause severe leg discomfort and serious complications, including clotting, leg edema, skin ulceration and thrombophlebitis," said Tal. "However, a universal problem caused by the condition is unsightliness of the bulging veins."

Vascular Insights is developing a simplified procedure using a single, disposable product for elimination of varicose veins. Among the procedure's advantages, the company believes it will eliminate the need for anesthesia, hospitalization or surgery, and cause less damage to surrounding tissue and nerves. This would translate into considerably reduced convalescence, complications and pain for patients.

Varicose veins, including sapheno-femoral reflux disease, affect between 75 and 150 million people in North America and Western Europe. The condition involves major blood vessels of the leg, and is different than "spider veins," which affects the minor blood vessels.

Traditional therapy for varicose veins is surgery, but worldwide only an estimated one million people undergo the extensive surgical stripping and ligation operations each year at a cost of as much as between $2,500 and $5,000 per leg.

"The simplicity of the Vascular Insights approach represents an attractive new treatment option for the present one million annual procedures and the 30 to 50 million varicose vein sufferers in the US who currently do not seek treatment," said John Marano, CEO of Vascular Insights.

Tal and Yale's Office of Cooperative Research (YU-OCR) together with Marano, a local entrepreneur and executive with extensive corporate management and start-up experience, founded Vascular Insights. Yale has applied for a patent on the technology and has exclusively licensed rights to Vascular Insights.

"Yale is delighted to bring inventors and entrepreneurs together creating a new business like Vascular Insights in the New Haven area," says Loraine Lombard, manager of the Vascular Insights project for the Office of Cooperative Research.

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KLP Enterprises, a private investment group located in Branford, CT, provided seed funds for initial operations and will provide an additional capital contribution upon successful completion of a first proof-of-concept study expected this year. Further information is available through YU-OCR at, http://www.yale.edu/ocr or ocr@yale.edu.

Contact: Janet Rettig Emanuel
janet.emanuel@yale.edu
Yale University

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