Occlutech has announced that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted a breakthrough device designation for its implantable atrial flow regulator (AFR) for heart failure (HF) patients with preserved (HFpEF) or reduced (HFrEF) ejection fraction.
The AFR is for use in patients with Heart Failure with Preserved Ejection Fraction (HFpEF) or Reduced Ejection Fraction (HFrEF) and who, despite optimal medical therapy, experience worsening symptoms. The AFR maintains an interatrial shunt with a predetermined diameter allowing for controlled blood flow from the left to the right atrium enabling the left atrium to decompress and lower left atrial pressure. Reduced left atrial pressure has been shown to reduce heart failure symptoms and improve exercise tolerance.
Breakthrough device designations aim to accelerate the development, assessment, and approval of new treatments in severe diseases, including a prioritised review all the way through market approval.
“It is an important milestone for us to have received this second breakthrough designation for our AFR device.” says Sabine Bois, CEO of Occlutech Group. “After receiving the first breakthrough device designation for pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) in December 2020, the heart failure (HF) indication addresses a substantial market with rapid growth and only limited options for the treatment for critically ill patients. We are looking forward to developing an important new therapy and working closely with the FDA on both indications.”
Occlutech has sales of congenital and structural heart products in over 80 countries and maintains manufacturing and R&D facilities in Jena, Germany and Istanbul, Turkey. Occlutech has developed many novel products and technologies to improve treatment of patients in these and related areas.
