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A 78-year-old blind man, Jamal Furani from Haifa, regained his sight after being implanted with an artificial cornea developed by CorNeat Vision, the biomimetic implant company said. It was the first successful implant.
The artificial cornea, which fits into the eye wall, was implanted earlier this month by Professor Irit Bahar, director of the ophthalmology department at Rabin Medical Center in Israel. While removing the bandages, Furani was able to read the text and recognize family members, the startup said in a statement earlier this month.
Furnai, who suffered from edema and other illnesses, had a damaged cornea, causing a decade of vision loss and defining him as legally blind.
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The CorNeat product, made from 100% synthetic, non-degradable porous material, replaces scarred or deformed corneas and does not require any donor tissue. It uses cellular technology and chemical engineering at the nanoscale to mimic the existing cellular environment. When implanted, the material integrates with living tissue and stimulates cell proliferation, leading to even further integration. The implant therefore does not trigger an adverse immune system response, the company said.
CorNeat KPro Kit for Artificial Corneal Implants developed by CorNeat Vision (YouTube screenshot)
Corneal disease is the second leading cause of blindness in most countries of the developing world, and the World Health Organization estimates that around 2 million patients per year suffer from corneal blindness.
“Unveiling that first implanted eye and being in that room, at the time, was surreal,” said Dr Gilad Litvin, CorNeat Vision co-founder, chief medical officer and inventor of CorNeat KPro. “After years of hard work, seeing a colleague implant the CorNeat KPro with ease and seeing another human regain their sight the next day was electrifying and moving, there were many tears in the room. This is an extremely important step for CorNeat Vision. ”
The implantation process is fairly straightforward and takes less than an hour, the company said in a YouTube video.
A total of 10 patients are approved for the clinical trial at Rabin Medical Center in Israel with two additional sites slated to open this month in Canada and six more at different stages of the approval process in France, United States and the Netherlands, Almog Aley-Raz, co-founder of CorNeat Vision, CEO and vice president of R&D, said in the statement.
The first trial includes blind patients who are not suitable candidates for or who have failed one or more corneal transplants, he added.
“Given the outstanding visual performance of our device, expected healing time and retention,” he said, the company plans to start a second study later this year with broader indications to approve the cornea. artificial “as the first-use treatment for donor tissue used in full thickness corneal transplants. ”
Founded in 2015 and based in Ra’anana, CorNeat has also developed CorNeat EverPatch, a non-degradable synthetic scleral patch, and CorNeat eShunt, a glaucoma drainage device. According to the Start-Up Nation Central database, the company has raised $ 12.3 million from investors to date.
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