Healthcare & Pharmaceutical Awards 2019

14 GHP / 2019 Healthcare & Pharmaceutical Awards Screening for Ebola would be possible with the correct VOC Biomarkers in place, and coupled with the ability to carry out this screening in the field, which is one of the aims of our technology, Ebola could be tackled in a much more effective way. Mobility is crucial. When might this technology be available? ANCON Medical is currently developing this technology for human trials in two sites; the facility in Minnesota (USA) is part of the state’s Medical Alley medical device manufacturing community, and the same facilities in Kent (UK) operate within the Innovation Centre located within the grounds of the University of Kent at Canterbury. The collaboration between the two sites will allow human trials to take place both in the US and UK in the coming months. The company is currently in the process of raising investment for these trials before a further raise to fund clinical trials later in the year. The technology could be on the market as early as 2021 or 2022 which would truly revolutionise what is a sometimes old- fashioned facet of medicine. Treatments for cancer are advancing at an ever-increasing rate, with innovation coming in the forms of new drugs, surgical equipment and techniques of radio and chemotherapy. But treatment is just one side of the coin when it comes to making cancer survivable in the long term with diagnosis at the earliest stage being the other. NBT technology and the natural world As with the vast majority of medical advances, ANCON Medical’s NBT technology has taken inspiration from the natural world and hopes to bring the ability to quite literally ‘sniff out’ diseases to the clinical arena, to the benefit of thousands. Sniffer dogs have been used for years to detect drugs, explosives and blood in a variety of situations. The dogs are trained to respond to the compounds given off by whatever the target substance is, whether that be in suitcases, on the street or in homes. A dog’s sense of smell is around 40 times more sensitive than that of a human’s which gives them this ability to detect smells – or volatile organic compounds as they often are – so much more effectively. It is not just dogs that can smell certain medical conditions, a common symptom of hyperglycaemia is the smell of acetone on the breath of a person, caused by ketoacidosis, an acute complication of diabetes. This tell- tale smell – the chemical used in nail polish – is an extreme example to show the power of illness to affect our breath. Recently, dogs have been used to indicate the presence of certain types of cancer from the compounds emitted by a person’s skin, blood and in some cases breath. And in one case a woman in the UK named Joy Milne was able to smell Parkinson’s disease on a person’s clothes and detected successfully each case of Parkinson’s. It is from this basis that the NBT technology has developed to its current state. The technology is in its current state over 1000 times more sensitive than the most effective sniffer dogs. Creating an even more accurate way to diagnose through ‘smell’ at a far lower cost than that of training and handling dogs. Ultimately, ANCON Medical presents unique solutions for the healthcare industry, providing a pathway to early detection capabilities that can be critical for treating deadly illnesses like lung cancer, tuberculosis and others. In future the firm’s creative technology could be used to detect, diagnose and keep track of over 400 serious diseases and illnesses. The scope to revolutionise the industry cannot be overstated, with daily screening, personalised medicine combined with AI and machine learning potentially coming together to create a future where diseases are treated before symptoms manifest. Contact Details: Company: ANCON Medical Contact: Wesley Baker Email: [email protected] Website: anconmedical.com