Description:

Our range of devices add value to the interventional industry through several ways.
Clinicians and Patients:
- Reducing X-ray artefact: our products are radiolucent for X-ray.
- Reducing motion artefact: reduced patient movement during CT acquisition or contrast flush studies for treating limb ischemia or stroke clot retrieval.
- Reducing clinician’s exposure to scatter radiation: scatter dose reduced at waist height, with 0° X-ray camera angle by 77% at operator waist height.
- Reducing clinician’s radiation dose: presenting the patient optimally for imaging reduces radiation dose by 30%.
- Reducing operator fatigue: through improved ergonomic positioning and workflow during image guided therapies, ensuring ongoing longevity of practice
- Improving patient comfort: flexibility of positioning to suit body shapes and sizes
Creation of the ITA range has also had a positive impact on our business financials:
- Growth has been steady since the ITA range introduction. The first product of the ITA range, the STARSystem, being released in 2013.
- Revenue for financial year end 2023 saw the ITA range contribute over $4 million NZD for the 12 months. This is a 625% increase from inception.
- Further financial growth anticipated from the last 4 products launched in the last 12 months. Revenue from these is yet to impact.
Capabilities
- Developing in inhouse expertise in Carbon fibre composites has not been easy but over the 10 yr period we have created 5 full time roles producing this equipment.
The design team was already skilled in taking external client briefs, and developing product designs through to mass manufacture.
As we transitioned towards creating our own proprietary products, we too shifted to a systemic and holistic focus in our design process to better understand and support the needs of both patient and clinician in the interventional healthcare space through:
- Embracing user centred design principles
- Developing empathetic interviewing
- Gaining MTANZ Certification for the design team to observe live medical cases
- Developing prototypes iterations provoking good and bad feedback to improve our designs
- Establishing in-house processes for validating new product opportunities
- Building a network of willing clinicians who had issues they needed solving and were interested to be involved in the development of prototypes.
- Developing a visual product development roadmap communicating the pipeline and giving visibility of the future range and direction
- Solidifying a feedback process placing our designers on booth at international medical meetings, allowing them to hear product feedback first hand.
Over the last 10 years we have designed our Imaging Table Accessories (ITA) range for use with C-arm Angiography, CT, MRI and Endoscopic Imaging systems. These are developed to complement brands such as Philips, Siemens, Toshiba & Medtronic.
The range has been developed from the ground up and now consists of 12 different products, mostly free from metal to enable high radiolucency and not interfere with the Images used to guide the interventions.
Outside of the primary use for Xray, our range is also designed to improve operator ergonomics, posture, and workflow/equipment management.