ISTO Technologies, Inc., a privately held company based in St. Louis, MO, is both a regenerative medicine and orthopedics company developing innovative cartilage and bone regeneration products for spinal therapy, sports medicine and trauma. ISTO is currently focused on the development of cell-based cartilage platform technology that can be applied to repair and regenerate damaged cartilage in the knee and spinal disc.
As the company sees it, cartilage is an attractive target for regeneration not only because of the prevalence of cartilage defects among patients, but also because cartilage tissue is immune privileged. Cartilage’s immune privilege is important as the company aims, essentially, to expand the allogenic juvenile donor cells it receives and give them to another patient. At present, the company is developing three products, RevaFlex, NuQu, and InQu. RevaFlex is engineered cartilage that can be implanted onto damaged cartilage in the knee using biological glue and is currently in a phase III clinical trial. NuQu is a platform that applies cultured cartilage cells to injured spinal discs and has performed well in early trials. It is currently in Phase I clinical study, which it expects to conclude in the fall of 2013. Lastly, diverging slightly from the company’s first two products, ISTO is developing InQu, a platform for bone regeneration that combines the biopolymer PLGA and hyaluronic acid that provides a unique scaffold to regrow bone.
Ultimately, the potential for these products is significant – they both address substantial market needs and could be effective, nearly-universal cartilage repair therapies. The market for such a therapy is, unsurprisingly, huge. It is estimated that, between joint replacements, injuries, arthritis, etc… such a therapy could influence over one million procedures each year. And, not only is there a great demand for such a therapy, the fact that there are as yet no effective cartilage regeneration therapies further magnifies that demand.
While ISTO is initially practicing and testing its technology on damaged cartilage in the knee and back, as well as on bone regeneration, it’s not hard to imagine the company’s technology being applicable to joint injuries of many kinds. Cartilage regeneration is often referred to as the ‘holy grail’ of orthopedics and if the company’s technology continues to expand and perform well in trials, ISTO may just be able to find that holy grail.
Please find more information on ISTO at their website, www.istotech.com, or by viewing their profile on the OneMedDatabase http://www.onemedplace.com/database/list/cid/1756/.