Front Line Medical Technologies has received Health Canada approval for its COBRA-OS (Control of bleeding, resuscitation, arterial occlusion system) device after three years of research and development. The COBRA-OS is an aortic occlusion device with a low-profile for temporary haemorrhage control and resuscitation.
“Even with all the advances in medicine today, trauma patients are primarily still dying from blood loss—this is our chance to change that,” said Adam Power, practicing vascular surgeon and co-founder of Front Line Medical Technologies. “While REBOA [resuscitative endovascular balloon occlusion of the aorta] continues to emerge as a life-saving procedure, we saw the need for a simple, fast, low-profile device to maximise its benefit and ultimately save more lives.”
A press release from the company states that the COBRA-OS is the first 4 French REBOA device, making it the smallest on the market. Its significantly decreased size allows healthcare personnel to quickly and easily deploy COBRA-OS, decreasing the time of the procedure and potentially improving patient outcomes, the statement reads.
This device can be used in multiple situations, including non-compressible torso haemorrhage in trauma, postpartum haemorrhage, and gastrointestinal haemorrhage. While it has been primarily performed in-hospital, it is currently also being deployed in pre-hospital settings and military environments and being investigated for nontraumatic cardiac arrest.
“We have already seen great results, both from our pre-clinical and user validation studies,” said Asha Parekh, biomedical engineer, co-founder, and CEO of Front Line Medical Technologies. “When it comes to blood loss, timing is crucial and while most REBOA procedures take about 10 minutes, the COBRA-OS has taken just over a minute in our studies. Our ultimate goal is to lower the barriers to REBOA use around the world and after three years of hard work behind the scenes, Health Canada approval is our first step in making that happen.”
