South Australian business CPIE Pharmacy Services (CPIE) is preparing to trial prototypes of a single use, portable, electronic drug delivery pump specifically designed for the hospital in the home sector
CPIE general manager, Andrew Sluggett said the compact pumps would be able to deliver various infusions including antibiotics, chemotherapy drugs, post-operative pain relief and rheumatoid arthritis treatments.
The company said it first started looking at developing its own pumps because the electronic and mechanical infusion pumps they were using were not proving effective in the home programs it services for a number of hospitals in Adelaide, the capital of South Australia.
“Electronic pumps are well suited to the hospital environment where you’ve got a lot of people around who can manage it. If you stick that same pump in a home setting you create a whole new set of problems,” Sluggett said.
He continued: “The mechanical pump doesn’t make noise at night, they don’t flash, a lot of them don’t have alarms but they’ve got unacceptable accuracy. Our device maintains the positive features of the electronic device with all the advantages of the mechanical one.”
Home infusions are increasing globally as the health industry looks at ways to increase efficiency and ease the burden on hospital systems, according to CPIE.
CPIE is working with medical device design house Hydrix to develop more prototypes in the coming months to be used in focus groups and demonstrations to clinicians.
Sluggett said the second generation of its pumps would likely incorporate Internet of Things, wearable and smart phone technologies to allow remote monitoring. This would enable the devices to liaise directly with health care providers, collect data and monitor performance to ensure correct doses were being delivered, according to the company.
CPIE Pharmacy Services last month received a BioSA Industry Development grant to help fast-track commercial production of its patent-protected pumps. It has also received support from Flinders University’s Medical Device Partnering Program.
Sluggett said the CPIE product was on track to be available commercially in the second half of 2017.