Julian,
Many thanks for the NB report. It contains exciting information that is new to me. I added a full position last Tuesday; and was contemplating taking a quick trading profit. I have other companies that I'd sell first.
The 2 points extracted from the conference call strongly imply that Visudyne revenues will vastly exceed (by up to a factor of 4) current analyst estimates. This is much more exciting than I'd dreamed.
Again, your sharing of the report is much appreciated.
Ian.
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6. Off-label use could dwarf the approved indication. Since physicians have nothing else to offer patients, Visudyne is likely to be used in all a good proportion of the 200,000 new patients per year in the U.S., even though it will be approved for predominantly classic AMD only. There are also about 40 other eye diseases, each with incidences of 5,000-20,000 patients, that are caused by abnormal blood vessel growth [40 x 20,000= 800,000]. These blood vessels are as a result of a multiple of different conditions such as histoplasmosis,
inflammation, infections, high myopia etc. Retinologists are likely to explore and use photodynamic therapy off label for these diseases similarly to what was done with thermal laser.
8. In a move that he believed to be unprecedented prior to FDA approval, Medicare has already stated that it will accept billing for photodynamic therapy. In its new code book effective January 2000, there is a statement that it can be billed using the existing retinal laser code. Reimbursement will be about US$800 per treatment. No problems are anticipated for the reimbursement of Visudyne itself. He expects that the miscellaneous drug code will be used until a permanent code is received. |
