Flow Forward Medical, a medical device company focused on improving outcomes for haemodialysis patients through the rapid creation of high-quality vascular access sites, has announced it has raised an additional US$1.2 million in Series A financing from a group of investors, including Mid-America Angels, bringing the total funding raised to date to more than US$8 million.
Additionally, Flow Forward announced that the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) recently awarded the company a US$225,000 Phase 1 SBIR grant to continue the development of the company’s Arteriovenous Fistula Eligibility (AFE) System, a medical device that uses rapid non-pulsatile blood flow to dilate peripheral veins prior to the creation of arteriovenous fistula (AVF) vascular access sites. The company states that it is currently preparing for a first-in-human clinical trial.
“Currently, there are 2.5 million haemodialysis patients worldwide and a majority of these patients will experience difficulties establishing or maintaining vascular access sites,” stated Laura McCoolidge Classen, managing director of Mid-America Angels. “Each site failure puts patients at risk for a cycle of difficult and expensive repair or replacement procedures. We believe that Flow Forward’s approach to addressing the long-standing medical need to develop better vascular access sites has the potential to be a powerful solution for patients.”
“We are grateful for the support from our investors and the National Institutes of Health as we work to develop innovative products to establish high-quality vascular access sites for haemodialysis,” stated F Nicholas Franano, president and CEO of Flow Forward. “These additional resources will support the advancement of the AFE System into a first-in-human clinical trial, which we plan to initiate in 2019, and where we hope to show the potential of the AFE System to help physicians rapidly create fully mature and usable AVF vascular access sites that are reliable and long-lasting.”
