Building on their existing partnership to promote ultrasound-guided regional anesthesia Medovate and Konica Minolta Healthcare Americas Inc will showcase their combined solution and sponsor educational and training sessions at the American Society of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine (ASRA) 46th Annual Meeting.
Mercury Medical®, the primary US distributor of Medovate’s SAFIRA™ (SAFer Injection for Regional Anesthesia) will join the two companies in highlighting the importance of using ultrasound-guidance with SAFIRA™ to improve patient safety and clinical efficiency during regional anaesthesia procedures. The meeting will be held May 13-15 in Orlando, Florida.
The combined solution from Medovate and Konica Minolta unites two innovative systems that help promote accuracy and safety while streamlining regional anaesthesia procedures.
SAFIRA™ is a novel FDA cleared and CE marked device designed to limit injection pressure and automatically stop injection above 20psi to help reduce the risk of nerve injury. In addition, SAFIRA™ also transforms regional anaesthesia into a one-person procedure by allowing a single anesthesiologist to conduct the entire procedure. Current procedure is for an assistant to inject the anesthetic solution at the required pressure while the anesthesiologist places the needle using ultrasound guidance.
Konica Minolta’s SONIMAGE® HS2 Compact Ultrasound System features Simple Needle Visualization (SNV®), an advanced algorithm that improves needle visibility and increases accuracy in needle placement, both for in-plane and out-of-plane approaches. SNV® also adjusts the sensitivity of needle visualisation depending on the type of tissue.
At ASRA’s 2021 meeting, Medovate is supporting an abstract presentation and poster, “Evaluation of a New Regional Anaesthesia Pump Designed to Help Prevent Nerve Injury,” discussing the results of a clinical evaluation involving 34 patients. Additionally, Konica Minolta is sponsoring a webinar with Douglas Jaffe, DO, an anesthesiologist with Wake Forest Baptist Health on regional anesthesia. Dr. Jaffe is an expert in ultrasound-guided regional anesthesia procedures and has published and lectured extensively on the topic.
Chris Rogers, Sales & Marketing Director at Medovate, commented: “Innovation and improving patient safety are at the foundation of the development of SAFIRA™. We are delighted to be able to physically demonstrate the SAFIRA™ device at the upcoming ASRA Meeting. Enabling clinicians to get ‘hands on’ with SAFIRA™ will really help them understand and see for themselves the potential benefits of the technology for improving outcomes. We look forward to supporting our distributor Mercury Medical and working with Konica Minolta at the 46th Annual ASRA Meeting to help anesthesiologists understand the benefits of a combined solution for regional anesthesia using SAFIRA™ and leading ultrasound technology from Konica Minolta to help improve patient safety and realise potential cost optimisation benefits.”
Eric Sumner, Executive Vice President Ultrasound Sales said: “At Konica Minolta, we are committed to providing educational and training resources to anesthesiologists who want to adopt best practices and utilize advanced technologies that promote safety and efficiency in regional anesthesia procedures. Our collaboration with Medovate and Mercury Medical will highlight the clinical value and patient benefits of regionalanaesthesia, and help more anesthesiologists to provide this important service in their practice.”
Mercury Medical®, Inc. is dedicated to delivering clinically differentiated critical care technology that saves lives throughout the world. For over 55 years clinicians have relied on Mercury Medical® as their resource for quickly responding to clinical needs with solutions that improve patient outcomes effectively. The company provides a legacy of innovative products to critical care areas of neonatal, anesthesia, respiratory and EMS markets in more than 58 countries.
Dr. John Gargaro, President and CEO at Mercury Medical®, added: “We believe SAFIRA™ along with SONIMAGE HS2 will revolutionise regional anesthesia across the United States. As a company, Mercury Medical® has a rich experience in bringing innovative, clinically differentiated medical devices to market. These ingenious devices will improve patient safety and operating room efficiency simultaneously by putting the entire regional block procedure back where it belongs – in the anesthesiologist’s hands. We are excited to work with Medovate and Konica Minolta to provide additional clinical resources to the attendees at the ASRA event and beyond through our clinical resources. The combination of the SONIMAGE HS2 and SAFIRA™ delivers the innovation in regional anesthesia that will help drive clinical adoption.
There are numerous patient benefits resulting from the use of regional anesthesia, including better post-operative analgesia, decreased opioid consumption and length of stay, early rehabilitation, fewer anesthesia-related side effects and high patient satisfaction compared to general anesthesia.1,2.