Feedback plc
("Feedback" or the "Company")
Intention to develop a product incorporating TexRAD for kidney stones
Feedback plc (AIM: FDBK), the medical imaging software company, previously announced on 13 April 2015 that it had signed a research agreement with the Oxford Stone Group at the University of Oxford & Oxford University Hospital NHS Trust ("Oxford"), UK to investigate the potential future clinical application of Feedback's TexRAD texture analysis software on computed tomography (CT) image data of patients with kidney stones. On 11 May 2015, Feedback announced the pilot results from a preliminary feasibility study.
A larger retrospective validation study comprising 90 patients carried out by the Oxford research team led by Mr Ben Turney (Bernard Senior Clinical Researcher in Urology at the University of Oxford and Honorary Consultant Urological Surgeon) is currently under way.
Following these studies, Feedback is pleased to announce the incorporation of a 50:50 joint venture company "Stone Checker Software Ltd" ("Stone Checker") with U.K. Urology Associates Limited (UKUA) to commercialise the specific application of TexRAD texture analysis in Urolithiasis. To facilitate this, Feedback Plc has granted a licence of TexRAD intellectual property to Stone Checker.
UKUA has expertise in a wide range of technology applications in the specialist Urology field. This knowledge extends from the development and distribution of novel medical equipment for both benign and malignant urological diseases through to the use of software in urodynamics. The team comprises an experienced group of healthcare technology innovators.
The vision of Stone Checker is to develop a composite risk stratification software product following stringent clinical standards and regulatory standards. TexRAD CT texture analysis will be incorporated with other known clinical markers to develop an integrated product which would potentially assist urologists and radiologists to provide better patient management and treatment decisions for improved patient outcomes. There is a large potential worldwide market for a non-invasive risk stratification tool based on the common occurrence of kidney stones around the world.
Mr Jeevan Virk, Chief Operations Officer of UKUA commented:
"The opportunity to collaborate with Feedback plc in the development of a specific urological software is hugely exciting and will provide enormous benefits to patients who will receive appropriate therapy, clinicians who will be able to optimise their use of time and improve success rates, and the healthcare payers who will no longer have to pay for high failure rates in lithotripsy. It is unusual to have a product which fully lines up to provide benefits to the whole clinical team, but this is the promise of Stone Checker software."
Dr. Balaji Ganeshan, Chief Scientist & New Business Officer of the Company's subsidiaries TexRAD Ltd & Cambridge Computed Imaging Ltd commented:
"We are delighted with the formation of a new JV company with UKUA, Stone Checker Software Ltd, to develop a novel composite clinical score based software product dedicated to the management of kidney stone patients."
For further information contact:
Feedback plc |
Tel: 01954 718072 |
Simon Barrell / Trevor Brown / Tom Charlton |
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Sanlam Securities UK (Nominated Adviser and Joint Broker) |
Tel: 020 7628 2200 |
Simon Clements / Virginia Bull |
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Peterhouse Corporate Finance Ltd (Joint Broker) |
Tel: 020 7469 0936 |
Lucy Williams / Duncan Vasey |
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Notes to editors:
TexRAD is a novel sophisticated imaging risk stratification research tool that analyses the textures in existing radiological scans. This research software application analyses textures, detecting and measuring tumour heterogeneity (complexity) from these images, revealing more information from medical images than is readily visible to the naked eye. Research to date has shown that TexRAD could potentially assist the clinician (as an 'Imaging-Biomarker') in confident decision-making: it has the potential to assess the prognosis, disease-severity (e.g. risk of metastases) and response evaluation of patients with cancer. Currently TexRAD research has shown great potential in many different oncological sites, including, colorectal, breast, lung, prostate, oesophageal, head & neck, lymphoma, liver and renal cancers and could potentially be employed as a heterogeneity assessing tool in the era of 'Precision and Personalized Medicine'. TexRAD is manufactured under licence by company Cambridge Computed Imaging Ltd, a subsidiary of Feedback plc. More information is available on www.fbk.com and www.texrad.com.
