CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--NinePoint Medical, Inc., an emerging leader in the development of medical devices for in vivo pathology, today announced the appointment of 11 leading experts to its newly formed clinical and technology advisory boards. These experts will support the continued growth of NinePoint Medical and will serve as strategic advisers to the company as it progresses a next-generation high-resolution optical imaging technology, the Nvision VLE Imaging System.
“We look forward to working closely with these distinguished experts as we continue to develop our groundbreaking technology, which we believe can dramatically improve patient care,” said Charles Carignan, M.D., president and chief executive officer of NinePoint Medical. “Their unique and diverse perspectives within the areas of endoscopy, pathology and imaging will be instrumental as we prepare to market the Nvision VLE Imaging System, which recently received 510(k) clearance from the FDA for use as an imaging tool in the evaluation of human tissue microstructure by providing two-dimensional, cross sectional, real-time depth visualization. These appointments will be invaluable as we focus our efforts on further developing the technology to improve the detection, diagnosis and treatment of mucosal and soft tissue diseases.”
The inaugural members of NinePoint Medical’s clinical and technology advisory boards include:
Clinical Advisory Board:
- Blair A. Jobe, M.D., FACS, is the Sampson Family Endowed Professor of Surgery within the department of cardiothoracic surgery at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. He currently serves as the director of esophageal research and director of esophageal diagnostics and therapeutic endoscopy within the division of thoracic and foregut surgery. Dr. Jobe’s areas of interest are in esophageal cancer, Barrett’s esophagus, esophageal preservation in the face of early malignancy, minimally invasive surgery, endoscopic therapy, esophageal motility disorders and complicated gastroesophageal reflux disease.
- Laurence Lovat, MBBS, Ph.D., is a consultant gastroenterologist at University College Hospital and reader in gastroenterology and laser medicine at University College London. Dr. Lovat’s research focuses on optical techniques for diagnosing and treating pre-malignant lesions arising within Barrett's esophagus. He developed photodynamic therapy for high-grade dysplasia in Barrett's and also worked on elastic scattering spectroscopy to detect dysplasia in patients undergoing endoscopic surveillance. He also serves as a specialist adviser to the UK Department of Health and NICE.
- Norman S. Nishioka, M.D., is a gastroenterologist at Massachusetts General Hospital and an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Nishioka has special clinical interest in the diagnosis and treatment of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), Barrett’s esophagus and early esophageal cancer. He has contributed to the clinical development of various optical imaging technologies including optical coherence tomography and optical frequency domain imaging in the gastrointestinal tract.
- Gary J. Tearney, M.D., Ph.D., is a co-inventor of NinePoint Medical’s optical imaging technology. As the associate director of the Wellman Center for Photomedicine at Massachusetts General Hospital and the optical diagnostics program leader at the Center for Integration of Medicine and Innovative Technology, Dr. Tearney’s research focuses on optical coherence tomography and other imaging modalities. He is also a professor of pathology at Harvard Medical School and an affiliated faculty member of the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology.
- Michael Wallace, M.D., is a professor of medicine with the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and is the director of research for the department of medicine and the division of gastroenterology and hepatology at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Fla. Dr. Wallace's areas of interest are in endoscopic ultrasound (EUS), gastrointestinal oncology, clinical research, advanced endoscopic imaging technologies, endoscopic mucosal resection and intestinal stent placement. In collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dr. Wallace pioneered the development of light scattering spectroscopy which has now been applied to the detection of early cancer in Barrett's esophagus, colon cancer and other non-GI cancers.
- Kenneth Wang, M.D., is director of the Advanced Endoscopy Group and Esophageal Neoplasia Clinic and a consultant in the division of gastroenterology and hepatology at the Mayo Clinic. Additionally, Dr. Wang is editor in chief of the journal Diseases of the Esophagus and associate editor of the journal Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology. His areas of interest include laser therapy, Barrett's esophagus, esophageal cancer, photodynamic therapy, endoscopic ultrasonography, gastrointestinal bleeding, optical biopsy, laser confocal microscopy, radiofrequency abalation and endoscopic mucosal resection/dissection.
- Herbert Wolfsen, M.D., is a professor of medicine at the Mayo Medical School and chief of gastrointestinal endoscopy at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Fla. Dr. Wolfsen’s areas of interest include advanced endoscopic imaging for detection of Barrett’s disease, dysplasia and esophageal cancer, and endoscopic therapy for Barrett's disease, including radiofrequency ablation, photodynamic therapy and cryotherapy.
Technology Advisory Board:
- Michael Becich, M.D., Ph.D., is a professor and chairman of the department of biomedical informatics at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. He is also associate director of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute and co-director of the Clinical and Translational Science Institute at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. Dr. Becich's research interests are focused on the interface between clinical informatics, imaging informatics and bioinformatics. He has been an innovator and entrepreneur in the area of whole slide imaging and digital pathology, and their use in improving patient care and safety.
- Brett E. Bouma, Ph.D., is a co-inventor of NinePoint Medical’s optical imaging technology. He is a professor of dermatology and health sciences and technology at Harvard Medical School and an associate physicist at the Wellman Center for Photomedicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. Bouma’s research on optical technology has contributed to the development of imaging modalities such as optical coherence tomography, spectrally encoded confocal microscopy and spectrally encoded endoscopy.
- Sanjiv Sam Gambhir, M.D., Ph.D., is the Virginia & D.K. Ludwig Professor of Cancer Research and the chair of radiology at Stanford University School of Medicine. He also heads up the Canary Center at Stanford for Cancer Early Detection. An internationally recognized researcher in molecular imaging with more than $75 million of NIH funding as the principal investigator, Dr. Gambhir’s lab has focused on interrogating fundamental molecular events in living subjects. He has developed and clinically translated several multimodality molecular imaging strategies, including imaging of gene and cell therapies.
- Jacques Van Dam, M.D., Ph.D., is a professor of medicine at the University of Southern California and director of clinical gastroenterology at the USC University Medical Center. Dr. Van Dam’s areas of expertise include pancreatic, esophageal, gastric and colorectal cancer. Dr. Van Dam’s clinical expertise is in diagnostic and therapeutic endoscopy, advanced interventional endoscopy, and advanced endoscopic imaging including microendoscopy and optical biopsy.
About NinePoint Medical, Inc.
NinePoint Medical, Inc. is a transformational medical device company developing innovative, real-time, in vivo pathology devices focused on dramatically improving patient care. Through its proprietary Nvision VLE Imaging System, NinePoint intends to bridge the gap between the diagnosis and treatment of disease. The Nvision VLE Imaging System will enable physicians and pathologists, for the first time, to view real-time, high-resolution, volumetric images of organs and tissues up to 3mm deep at less than 10 micron resolution. Initially, NinePoint is focusing on devices that enable real-time, endoscopic screening and surveillance of diseases of the mucosa of various tissues that are often precancerous. Eventually, the company intends to develop medical devices that provide physicians with immediately actionable information and that will allow them to diagnose and treat patients during the same procedure. This convergence of access, diagnosis and treatment during one procedure is expected to improve patient experiences and outcomes, improve the efficiency of care and provide important savings to the health care system. Headquartered in Cambridge, Mass., NinePoint is backed by Third Rock Ventures and Prospect Venture Partners. For more information, please visit www.ninepointmedical.com.