Magnolia Medical Announces Additional Funding of $7.25 Million to Expand Use of SteriPath for Sepsis Blood Testing

SEATTLE, April 4, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Magnolia Medical Technologies today announced additional investment funding of $7.25 million, bringing total company financing to date to $30 million. Magnolia Medical is the developer of SteriPath®, the only blood collection system clinically proven to virtually eliminate "false positive" blood culture test results from patients with suspected sepsis.

Several institutional investors participated in the financing including the Canepa Advanced Healthcare Fund. In conjunction with the financing, Paul Enever, Ph.D., Managing Director with Canepa Healthcare, has joined the company's Board of Directors.

The company's blood collection system, SteriPath, enables hospitals to improve antimicrobial stewardship at a time of increasing concern about unnecessary use of antibiotics and associated resistance.

Blood culture tests that are false positive for sepsis often result in substantial overuse of antibiotics, creating avoidable patient safety risks and driving unnecessary costs to the US healthcare system in excess of $4 billion annually in patient overtreatment.

The SteriPath blood collection system significantly reduces false positive results by sequestering contaminants and creating access for sterile blood flow into the culture test bottles. The single-use system has been proven in multiple clinical settings to reduce false positive blood cultures by over 90%, thereby helping to lessen the unnecessary use of antibiotics and associated patient risks and complications.

Blood culture is the essential blood test used to diagnose sepsis, a complication from bloodstream infection that claims over 200,000 U.S. lives each year and is a leading cause of death. With the current use of traditional collection methods, an average of 20 to 50 percent of positive blood culture tests are contaminated and ultimately determined to be false positive.

That original misdiagnosis in turn often exposes patients to potent antibiotic treatments that may be unnecessary and typically extend hospital length of stay. With longer patient stays, there is an increase in both healthcare costs and the risk of hospital-acquired conditions.

Among key opinion leaders who have seen SteriPath significantly reduce false positives in their facilities is Andrew Sama, MD, FACEP, Past President of the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP).

"Especially in the emergency department environment, hospitals face many challenges to obtain non-contaminated blood culture samples from patients with suspected sepsis," said Dr. Sama. "Our hospital had already undertaken a wide range of efforts to reduce contamination. But our patient population and clinical workflow realities made it very challenging to obtain culture samples aseptically. SteriPath changed all of that -- and quickly reduced our false positive rate by greater than 90% from over 5% to under 0.5%."

There are an estimated 2 million antibiotic-resistant infections in the U.S. each year, resulting in at least 23,000 deaths. Growing concern over antibiotic resistance has prompted the Joint Commission to require hospitals to institute antimicrobial stewardship programs this year.

"We are proud to support the valuable contribution to better medical care represented by SteriPath, which addresses a widely recognized, unmet need for better blood collection technology," said Dr. Enever of Canepa Healthcare. "The combination of the clinical as well as economic value created by SteriPath is a win for patients, hospitals and public health alike."

Greg Bullington, cofounder and CEO of Magnolia Medical, said the new funding will boost the company's efforts to make its technology the new standard of care. "Our clinical trial results have consistently demonstrated 10x better performance with SteriPath compared to the current standard of care. The impact we've had at major medical institutions demonstrates that our technology improves patient care, reduces inappropriate utilization of powerful antibiotics and helps hospitals realize substantial net savings," Bullington said. "Blood culture contamination is a measureable, tangible problem that hospitals can now fix using our SteriPath system." 

Proceeds from this financing supplement a previously announced 2016 investment of $13.8 million led by HealthQuest Capital and will be used to accelerate commercial adoption of SteriPath, as well as advance the company's R&D pipeline of devices to significantly improve the consistency, accuracy and predictability of critical laboratory tests. 

Resources

* Summary of clinical studies

* Overview video of SteriPath system

About Magnolia Medical Technologies

Magnolia Medical is a medical device company that develops and manufactures innovative blood and bodily fluid collection devices that significantly improve the accuracy, consistency and predictability of critical in-vitro diagnostic (IVD) tests. False positive and false negative laboratory test results in the acute care setting create confusion and uncertainty that commonly lead to inappropriate, unnecessary treatments. These misdiagnoses often significantly increase utilization of antibiotics and associated complications as well as patient length of stay and risk for healthcare-associated infections (HAIs). By mechanically eliminating human errors that cause erroneous test results through elegantly engineered bodily fluid collection devices, Magnolia Medical's products significantly improve patient safety and reduce hospital costs. The total potential market for Magnolia Medical's technology exceeds $1.5 billion annually. For more information, visit www.magnolia-medical.com.

Contact: Liz Dowling
Dowling & Dennis Public Relations
Tel. 415-388-2794
[email protected]

SOURCE Magnolia Medical Technologies

Related Links

http://www.magnolia-medical.com