Munich, Germany - Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Hepa Wash GmbH (Hepa Wash), a medical device company dedicated to the development of next-generation liver support systems announced today the closing of a seed-financing round of €1.1 million led by a group of experienced private investors. The new funds will be used to further establish its novel and proprietary technology for the treatment of patients with liver failure and to fund animal trials
Bernhard Kreymann, CEO and Founder of Hepa Wash, comments, “We are very pleased about the successful closing of our second seed financing round and proud to have attracted such a distinguished group of long-term committed and financially strong private investors of the health care sector. Hepa Wash welcomes the endorsement of its activities by these renowned individuals and industry experts. The additional funding will allow us to move forward developing this very innovative technology which has the potential to significantly improve the condition and life of so many patients with severe liver failure.”
Liver failure (acute or chronic) is one of the leading causes of death worldwide. At present, there is no effective direct treatment for end-stage liver disease. The only reliable curative therapy is liver transplantation. However, liver transplantation is highly limited by the number of available organs and therefore only available for a minority of patients. In Germany, for example, there are at least 30,000 deaths due to liver failure each year but only 1,000 liver transplantations. The majority of patients is dying while at hospital due to the deterioration of existing liver cirrhosis caused e.g. by infections. And even 50 % of the patients that are on a transplant list are dying while waiting for transplantation. Thus, there is an urgent need for an artificial means of liver detoxification system to facilitate recovery of patients from liver failure without transplantation but also to improve the still limited 3-year survival rate of patients receiving a transplant.