Biocontrol Gets $1.5 Million Agreement From U.S. Army
INDIANA, Pa., Sept. 10 /PRNewswire/ -- We have all heard the stories of people who have fallen through the ice or apparently drown in icy waters only to be resuscitated with little or no adverse effects.
Now, that cooling process called hypothermia may become a tool to be used by medical personnel.
Biocontrol Technology, Inc., located in Indiana, PA, a division of Pittsburgh-based BICO, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: BIKO), has received an assistance agreement from the U.S. Army Medical Research Acquisition Activity in Fort Detrick, MD to develop the hardware for cooling the body.
Dr. Peter Safar of the Safar Center for Resuscitation at the University of Pittsburgh is conducting research on this phenomenon. The process of quickly cooling the body to a state of suspended animation is believed to provide an increased time frame for patients to be transported to a hospital, MASH unit or other emergency care center. Research at the Safar Center suggests that the early and rapid induction of mild hypothermia in patients after having suffered cardiac arrest, brain trauma, or patients in shock can increase the chance of survival without brain damage.
Rapid introduction of profound hypothermia can extend the period for resuscitation to an hour or longer in patients who have not been able to be resuscitated by a standard form of care.
The device that would induce emergency hypothermia has not yet been developed. This one-year agreement, which is worth over $1.5 million, will allow Biocontrol to develop the required prototype devices for continued laboratory research. Biocontrol and the Safar Center will then refine the devices for clinical trials. This award covers the first year of a proposed three-year program.
Dr. Safar, founder of the Center for Resuscitation Research in Pittsburgh, and his research team have been working on resuscitation methods for many years. He successfully co-developed and introduced cardiopulmonary cerebral resuscitation (CPCR) methods for reviving victims of trauma or cardiac arrest starting in the 1950s. He has conducted several clinical studies in humans and animals.
Biocontrol Technology has had previous success in temperature altering technology used in medical care. The Indiana, PA firm makes the ThermoChem(TM) HT-1000 system for its sister company, ViaCirq, Inc. The ThermoChem device utilizes hyperthermia, or heating of the body, in the treatment of some forms of cancer. The device recently received approval by the FDA to be marketed in the U.S. and thus far is being used in hospitals like the Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center and Zale Lipshy University Hospital, a private teaching hospital for the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas.
BICO, Inc. has its corporate offices in Pittsburgh and is involved in the development and manufacture of biomedical devices and environmental solutions.
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SOURCE Biocontrol Technology, Inc.
/CONTACT: Investors: Diane McQuaide, +1-412-429-0673 or fax:
+1-412-279-9690; or Media: Susan Taylor, +1-412-429-0673 or fax:
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/Web site: bico.com /
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