Project description
Healing chronic wounds faster
Chronic wounds like diabetic foot ulcers are hard to heal. Dressing the wound to promote autolysis and reduce microbial presence is crucial. Current wound dressings are made of native collagen but have several limitations in terms of application and removal, fixed shapes and limited draining capacity. In this context, the EU-funded NATURALSKIN project has a solution: a rapid absorption linear (denaturalised) collagen-made wound dressing. Called NaturalSkin, this wound dressing has rapid healing characteristics (due to rapid and complete absorption of the matrix). The project is tasked with analysing the market viability of this advanced wound dressing.
Objective
The World Health Organization and United Nations issued a warning statement on the world’s health in September 2011 on hard to heal wounds as 2-3% of world population is expected to suffer severe wound in life. Estimated cost of treating chronic wounds is between 2-3% of annual healthcare budgets (treatments and hospitalization). Essential part of the wound care treatment (after removal of devitalized tissue) is the use of dressings to promote autolysis and reduce microbial presence.
EKOLBER has developed a rapid absorption linear (denaturalized) collagen made wound dressing (called NaturalSkin). This solution allows to improve dressings healing characteristics (due to rapid and complete absorption of the matrix) and reduction of dressing application times with a remarkable low price. Those improvements will contribute to reduce hospitals wound care costs and effectivity considerably.
The advanced wound dressing market is an enormous and growing market because the number of patients suffering from hard to deal and chronic wounds. Main factors driving the appearance of this kind of wounds are the diabetes, cardiovascular diseases and the aging.
Taking into account Natural Skins benefits, market needs and enormous existing market, a clear business opportunity for EKOLBER is outlined.
In this Phase 1 project, a feasibility study will be held to analyse the viability of the whole project, analysing market, product, business and financial features in order to guarantee the profitability of the investment in the identified markets and future scenarios.
Fields of science
- medical and health scienceshealth sciencesnursing
- engineering and technologyenvironmental engineeringwaste management
- social scienceseconomics and businessbusiness and managementbusiness models
- medical and health sciencesclinical medicinecardiologycardiovascular diseases
- medical and health sciencesbasic medicinepharmacology and pharmacy
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1Coordinator
20570 BERGARA, GIPUZKOA
Spain
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.