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Omnicell Inc Buoyant About Expansions In India, Assessing
Healthcare Sector
The $169 million, Omnicell Inc., a NASDAQ listed global major in healthcare
technologies, has identified India for its offshore software initiatives in
product development, testing and support. The company is assessing the India's
healthcare sector for possible installations to improve patient care here. The
company is also keen to generate more value out of its team representing the two
year old subsidiary, Omnicell India which is gearing up for an increase in head
count from 71 to 84 before the year end.
The need to augment human resources at Omnicell India came about after the
parent company's confidence in the Indian team's efforts so far. Omnicell Inc.
is getting proactive in its interaction with its team here to make the
products more robust. It s in the process of building expertise in product recall
on a real-time basis which can be dealt by the support team in India, stated
Drew.
Omnicell's medical-pharmacy automation solutions and medical surgical
supplies are installed at over 1,500 hospitals globally. The products are
designed to improve the work-flow at hospitals units. These include medication
dispensing systems, central pharmacy storage, controlled substance inventory
management solution, decision support application and web based procurement
systems which are installed at central pharmacy, nursing, operating room, cath
labs and patients bedside.
US is the biggest market for Omnicell followed by the European Union,
Australia, Japan and parts of the Asian region. Over 70 per cent of the business
comes from existing customers. The company is planning to launch novel
technologies to track drugs which will enhance operation of pharmacies in
hospitals.
The company has also experimented with Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)
applications for a cabinet to store cardiac valves and angioplasty stents. "This
would probably be first application in the US to be able track the expensive
medical devices," informed Christopher Drew.
(Ref: Chronicle Pharmabiz dated August 16, 2007)
Special Stents For Brain Clots Coming Soon To India
A new device is being launched in India that treat blockages in the brains
caused by the Intracranial Atherosclerotic disease, which is a condition that
caused strokes. The new device Wingspan Stent System is a stent specially
designed by Boston Scientific SMART to open clogged arteries in the brain.
Presently, stents designed for the heart are used to clear blockages of
arteries in the brain. The main disadvantage with these stents are that the mesh
metal tubes are stiff and so, difficult to manoeuvre in the brain. The chances
of these steel made stents causing injury to the more fragile blood vessels of
brain are higher. The cause of these fatty blockages was found to be ischemic
strokes in 50 per cent of Asians, who suffered from it.
"Wingspan is made of nitinol, an alloy of nickel and titanium, which puts
less pressure on the blood vessels when it expands," says Dr. Uday Limaye,
Associate Professor, Department of Radiology, King Edward Memorial Hospital,
Mumbai, who is one among the experts trained to use these stents.
"The intervention process for brain is similar to that used for heart"
explained Dr. Limaye. The conventional medical management for such blockages use
blood thinners such as coumadin and aspirin which make the blood thinner or try
to dissolve the clot to resume blood flow, but in cased of severe narrowing of
the artery, these have insignificant effect.
Wingspan also has an advantage that the procedure takes less time of about 30
minutes to two hours depending on the complexity of the case.
(Ref: Modern Medicare September, 2007)
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