Israel has the highest rate in the OECD countries of leg amputations due, among other reasons, to arterial blockages that are left untreated. Ordinarily, leg artery catheterization is carried out by inflating balloons or implanting supportive metal stents inside the blood vessel – but unfortunately, this method doesn’t always fully resolve the problem. The existing techniques are less effective on very-calcified blockages or long blockages.
Dr. Achihud Bendt, head of the imaging department and the invasive radiology unit at Netanya’s , performed – for the first time in Israel – the opening of a blockage in the arteries of a patient’s leg using a dedicated laser device. The Rehovot-based company Eximo Medical developed a device that helps the medical team break up blockages in blood vessel walls using a laser wave of a specific length.
The laser breaks down the biological and chemical substances that form the blockage and thus allows the blood vessels to open. The company’s proprietary "B-Laser," is comprised of a single-use catheter based on optical fibers that deliver short laser pulses, aspiration and . The device that performs the vaporization is called AURYON and received US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and CE (EU) approval.
The startup was sold six years ago to ANGIODYNAMICS. Their innovative treatment is routinely performed in the US, with some 100,000 leg artery catheterizations using laser having been performed there. Following recent CE approval, .
