CereVasc, a medical device company focused on neurological diseases, has secured a total of $43.9m in an expanded Series A financing led by the Perceptive Xontogeny Venture (PXV) Fund and ATON Partners.
The eShunt System is a minimally invasive cerebrospinal fluid shunt and delivery technology designed by the company to prevent the need for invasive surgery and extended hospitalisation associated with the current surgical treatment of hydrocephalus.
CereVasc intends to use the new investment to support the first-in-human clinical trial of the eShunt System, along with a follow on clinical studies to support regulatory approvals.
The company is planning to start the patient enrolment for the trials during the second half of 2020.
CereVasc chairman and CEO Dan Levangie said: “With this financing, we are well positioned to drive the development of our eShunt System forward as we strive to improve care for patients with hydrocephalus. We believe our first-in-human study will demonstrate the safety and effectiveness of the eShunt System and will set us on a path to achieve regulatory clearance in important markets.”
The eShunt system offers an alternative minimally-invasive surgery option
The system consists of an endovascularly implantable CSF shunt, an eShunt Implant, and an associated delivery componentry that prevents the need for invasive surgery, extended hospitalisation, and post-procedure pain management.
The eShunt Implant can be deployed by an interventional neuroradiologist, neurosurgeon, or neurologist using local anaesthesia, through a percutaneous femoral venous approach under X-ray guidance in an angiography suite.
CereVasc said that the design and deployment of eShunt Implant not only offers a minimally-invasive outpatient, day-surgery alternative but also brings down failures associated with ventriculo-peritoneal shunt (VPS) systems including treatment infection, catheter obstruction, and over-drainage.
CereVasc co-founder Carl B Heilman said: “Hydrocephalus – which is most commonly treated with an invasive surgical procedure – is one of the most common neurosurgical conditions impacting hundreds of thousands of children and adults in the US.”
CereVasc co-founder and director Adel Malek said: “Design improvements to decrease the high rate of shunt failure that leads to multiple invasive surgical procedures during a patient’s lifetime have been lacking over the last 60-years. An innovative therapy with novel endovascular design and minimally invasive deployment has the potential to significantly improve patient outcomes.”
