Empowered Patient Podcast

Jason Matuszewski, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board, and Andrew Van Vurst, Chief Operating Officer of BioStem Technologies have a vision to change the paradigm on the use of perinatal tissue for advanced wound care. Their initial target is complex wounds in the lower extremity region, specifically focusing on diabetic foot ulcers, venous ulcers, and pressure ulcers using a perinatal tissue allograft to promote healing.

Jason explains, "In general, non-healing and complex wounds share similar characteristics, high levels of protease, elevated inflammatory markers, low growth factor activity, and reduced cellular proliferation."

"Chronic non-healing wounds are wounds that have failed to progress through a timely sequence of repair or proceed through the wound healing process without restoring anatomic or functional results. A large amount of these wounds add a huge burden on cost. Specifically, our initial market, Medicare patients, things of that nature, add up to the tune of almost $25 billion spent on healthcare systems treating these complex wound types."

Andrew elaborates, "We've identified a process that we've acquired some IP around called BioRetain. Our goal with these tissues to set ourselves apart is not only to act as a protective barrier covering for the wound and the wound environment to create a healing environment but also to retain as much of the actual structural tissue components and biologic tissue components within the donated tissue we receive."

@BSEM_Tech #BioStem #WoundHealing #ComplexWounds #SkinRegeneration #RegenerativeMedicine

biostemtechnologies.com

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Jason Matuszewski, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board, and Andrew Van Vurst, Chief Operating Officer of BioStem Technologies have a vision to change the paradigm on the use of perinatal tissue for advanced wound care. Their initial target is complex wounds in the lower extremity region, specifically focusing on diabetic foot ulcers, venous ulcers, and pressure ulcers using a perinatal tissue allograft to promote healing.

Jason explains, "In general, non-healing and complex wounds share similar characteristics, high levels of protease, elevated inflammatory markers, low growth factor activity, and reduced cellular proliferation."

"Chronic non-healing wounds are wounds that have failed to progress through a timely sequence of repair or proceed through the wound healing process without restoring anatomic or functional results. A large amount of these wounds add a huge burden on cost. Specifically, our initial market, Medicare patients, things of that nature, add up to the tune of almost $25 billion spent on healthcare systems treating these complex wound types."

Andrew elaborates, "We've identified a process that we've acquired some IP around called BioRetain. Our goal with these tissues to set ourselves apart is not only to act as a protective barrier covering for the wound and the wound environment to create a healing environment but also to retain as much of the actual structural tissue components and biologic tissue components within the donated tissue we receive."

@BSEM_Tech #BioStem #WoundHealing #ComplexWounds #SkinRegeneration #RegenerativeMedicine

biostemtechnologies.com

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Sharon L. Rogers Ph.D. is the CEO of AmyriAD Therapeutics and has a deep understanding of the development of drugs to address the impact of Alzheimer's disease. Currently, the most common treatment is Aricept which Sharon developed and brought to market in 1996. Based on recent research, it does not appear that disease modification leads to clinical benefit or reduction in the progression of the disease.

Sharon explains, "We're not doing anything that's going to modify the underlying progression of the disease, at least that we know of. This is a relentless disease, and sooner or later, it will run its course, and the outcome is ultimately fatal. But, we can buy time for people. Whenever you can improve function, you can reduce reliance on skilled nursing care. You can reduce reliance on the caregiver and the burden that it brings to the loved ones of the patients. You can prolong the time to nursing home placement, which is just really horrible for everyone involved, the families and the patients."

"It is a simple tablet that will be administered once a day by mouth with just a little bit of water going with it. And as a matter of fact, this drug is designed to be administered as an adjunct to Aricept. Aricept is the standard of care. And so we want to maintain the Aricept treatment, but when you give AD101 on top of it as an oral drug, it increases the effects that were there before. So you'd have an additive improvement in cognition and global function."

@AmyriAD_Tx #Alzheimersdisease #Alzheimers #AD #BrainHealth #MentalHealth #AlzheimersAwareness #MemoriesAreWorthFightingFor

amyriadtherapeutics.com

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Sharon L. Rogers Ph.D. is the CEO of AmyriAD Therapeutics and has a deep understanding of the development of drugs to address the impact of Alzheimer's disease. Currently, the most common treatment is Aricept which Sharon developed and brought to market in 1996. Based on recent research, it does not appear that disease modification leads to clinical benefit or reduction in the progression of the disease.

Sharon explains, "We're not doing anything that's going to modify the underlying progression of the disease, at least that we know of. This is a relentless disease, and sooner or later, it will run its course, and the outcome is ultimately fatal. But, we can buy time for people. Whenever you can improve function, you can reduce reliance on skilled nursing care. You can reduce reliance on the caregiver and the burden that it brings to the loved ones of the patients. You can prolong the time to nursing home placement, which is just really horrible for everyone involved, the families and the patients."

"It is a simple tablet that will be administered once a day by mouth with just a little bit of water going with it. And as a matter of fact, this drug is designed to be administered as an adjunct to Aricept. Aricept is the standard of care. And so we want to maintain the Aricept treatment, but when you give AD101 on top of it as an oral drug, it increases the effects that were there before. So you'd have an additive improvement in cognition and global function."

@AmyriAD_Tx #Alzheimersdisease #Alzheimers #AD #BrainHealth #MentalHealth #AlzheimersAwareness #MemoriesAreWorthFightingFor

amyriadtherapeutics.com

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Jack Hoppin Ph.D. Chief Executive Officer and John Babich Ph.D., President and Chief Scientific Officer, and Co-Founders of Ratio Therapeutics aim to develop and produce best-in-class radiopharmaceuticals. Harnessing the power of radiation by making it into an injectable drug, Ratio is creating a way to find tumor cells anywhere in the body.

John explains, "And what we are doing, which is quite unique, is creating a platform of small molecules that can be radiolabeled with a variety of different isotopes. And these radioactive isotopes carry the ability to deliver different types of radiation -- beta particles and alpha particles. They have different toxicities and different lengths, so they travel in the tissue. And by combining the right molecules for the delivery with the right isotope, we're hoping to optimize the ability to control the tumor to basically put it into remission while maintaining a high quality of life. And we do that latter component by making sure that the injected material doesn't go to normal tissues and damage normal tissues."

"So we're trying to enhance the ratio of the delivery between the tumor itself and the normal tissues. The higher that ratio, the better off we are in being able to provide patients with a good treatment while maintaining a high quality of a life."

Jack elaborates, "That's the uniqueness of the platform in terms of the market itself. John was a pioneer in this market, and he has been in the space for some time. It's really been known in the past, and it's not a novel concept. Radioactive iodines have been used for a long time, and there's been a class of drugs, a few drugs adopted, but in the last five years or so, we've seen a big boom in the adoption of targeted radiotherapies."

@Ratio_Tx #Ratio #RatioTx #RatioTherapeutics #Radioactive #Radiopharmaceuticals #cancer #onco #MathMeetsMedicine #Pharmokinetics #Tumor

ratiotx.com

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Jack Hoppin Ph.D. Chief Executive Officer and John Babich Ph.D., President and Chief Scientific Officer, and Co-Founders of Ratio Therapeutics aim to develop and produce best-in-class radiopharmaceuticals. Harnessing the power of radiation by making it into an injectable drug, Ratio is creating a way to find tumor cells anywhere in the body.

John explains, "And what we are doing, which is quite unique, is creating a platform of small molecules that can be radiolabeled with a variety of different isotopes. And these radioactive isotopes carry the ability to deliver different types of radiation -- beta particles and alpha particles. They have different toxicities and different lengths, so they travel in the tissue. And by combining the right molecules for the delivery with the right isotope, we're hoping to optimize the ability to control the tumor to basically put it into remission while maintaining a high quality of life. And we do that latter component by making sure that the injected material doesn't go to normal tissues and damage normal tissues."

"So we're trying to enhance the ratio of the delivery between the tumor itself and the normal tissues. The higher that ratio, the better off we are in being able to provide patients with a good treatment while maintaining a high quality of a life."

Jack elaborates, "That's the uniqueness of the platform in terms of the market itself. John was a pioneer in this market, and he has been in the space for some time. It's really been known in the past, and it's not a novel concept. Radioactive iodines have been used for a long time, and there's been a class of drugs, a few drugs adopted, but in the last five years or so, we've seen a big boom in the adoption of targeted radiotherapies."

@Ratio_Tx #Ratio #RatioTx #RatioTherapeutics #Radioactive #Radiopharmaceuticals #cancer #onco #MathMeetsMedicine #Pharmokinetics #Tumor

ratiotx.com

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Dr. Robert Ross is the CEO of Surface Oncology, which is focused on immune modulation in the treatment of cancers. Their hypothesis is that IL-27, a cytokine, is telling the immune system to ignore the cancer and providing a hiding place for the cancer cells. By administering their drug SRF 388 to bind up all the IL-27, the immune system can properly identify and fight the cancer.

Robert explains, "SRF 388, all of these drugs, have such needlessly complicated names when they get started, but SRF 388 is an antibody. It's a protein that basically is trying to neutralize a cytokine. Cytokines are proteins in the body that the immune system uses to talk to other cells in the immune system. There are cytokines that stimulate the immune system, that make the immune system act more robustly, and there are cytokines that suppress the immune system. These are proteins that make the immune system go awry, for lack of a better word."

"We know, and we've used for a long time, drugs to try to mimic the effect of cytokines that stimulate the immune system. Well, what we noted, and our scientific advisory board noted, was that in some patients with cancer and in some types of cancer, you saw the presence of this uncommon cytokine that we call IL-27."

"IL-27 is a protein. It circulates in your body, but usually, there's very little of it, and in some patients with cancer, there are much higher levels of it. In the tumor itself, there are very high levels. Our hypothesis, our idea, was that it is possible that IL-27, that cytokine, was preventing the immune system from attacking the cancer."

@SurfaceOncology #Immunotherapy #ImmunoOncology #Immunology #Cytokines #LungCancer #GastricCancer #StomachCancer #LiverCancer #KidneyCancer

surfaceoncology.com

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Dr. Robert Ross is the CEO of Surface Oncology, which is focused on immune modulation in the treatment of cancers. Their hypothesis is that IL-27, a cytokine, is telling the immune system to ignore the cancer and providing a hiding place for the cancer cells. By administering their drug SRF 388 to bind up all the IL-27, the immune system can properly identify and fight the cancer.

Robert explains, "SRF 388, all of these drugs, have such needlessly complicated names when they get started, but SRF 388 is an antibody. It's a protein that basically is trying to neutralize a cytokine. Cytokines are proteins in the body that the immune system uses to talk to other cells in the immune system. There are cytokines that stimulate the immune system, that make the immune system act more robustly, and there are cytokines that suppress the immune system. These are proteins that make the immune system go awry, for lack of a better word."

"We know, and we've used for a long time, drugs to try to mimic the effect of cytokines that stimulate the immune system. Well, what we noted, and our scientific advisory board noted, was that in some patients with cancer and in some types of cancer, you saw the presence of this uncommon cytokine that we call IL-27."

"IL-27 is a protein. It circulates in your body, but usually, there's very little of it, and in some patients with cancer, there are much higher levels of it. In the tumor itself, there are very high levels. Our hypothesis, our idea, was that it is possible that IL-27, that cytokine, was preventing the immune system from attacking the cancer."

@SurfaceOncology #Immunotherapy #ImmunoOncology #Immunology #Cytokines #LungCancer #GastricCancer #StomachCancer #LiverCancer #KidneyCancer

surfaceoncology.com

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Greg Frost is the Chairman and CEO of EXUMA Biotech, which is working on a cancer cellular therapy that can be administered in a patient without lymphodepletion from chemotherapy. Traditionally, it was thought that some cells needed to be eliminated before new cells could be introduced. EXUMA is working on a rapid point of care, rPOC, technology that will allow this approach to be expanded to various cancers and readily available to patients.

Greg explains, "What we came to realize was that if we were to take our gene-loaded lymphocytes, and rather than putting them directly in the bloodstream, if we allowed them to start through what we call a synthetic lymph node or a local injection site, that those cells could get the programming and expansion where they were rather than just going straight in the bloodstream and every cell was diluted out into different locations in the body."

"If they could start in one location together as a team, you had a much better chance of, when they would get into the lymphatics and build up through there, of having a stronger team to go in and fight the cancer. And importantly, also it makes it very effective for them to be able to amplify the gene programs that we have to get up into circulation without the need for lymphodepleting chemotherapy first."

@EXUMABiotech #CellularTherapy #SolidTumors #BloodCancers #Chemotherapy #Lymphodepletion #Cancer

EXUMAbio.com

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Greg Frost is the Chairman and CEO of EXUMA Biotech, which is working on a cancer cellular therapy that can be administered in a patient without lymphodepletion from chemotherapy. Traditionally, it was thought that some cells needed to be eliminated before new cells could be introduced. EXUMA is working on a rapid point of care, rPOC, technology that will allow this approach to be expanded to various cancers and readily available to patients.

Greg explains, "What we came to realize was that if we were to take our gene-loaded lymphocytes, and rather than putting them directly in the bloodstream, if we allowed them to start through what we call a synthetic lymph node or a local injection site, that those cells could get the programming and expansion where they were rather than just going straight in the bloodstream and every cell was diluted out into different locations in the body."

"If they could start in one location together as a team, you had a much better chance of, when they would get into the lymphatics and build up through there, of having a stronger team to go in and fight the cancer. And importantly, also it makes it very effective for them to be able to amplify the gene programs that we have to get up into circulation without the need for lymphodepleting chemotherapy first."

@EXUMABiotech #CellularTherapy #SolidTumors #BloodCancers #Chemotherapy #Lymphodepletion #Cancer

EXUMAbio.com

Download the transcript here