PlenSat Digestible Balloons
One Minute PlenSat Summary
Good afternoon, My name is Erik Rutten and I am collaborating with PlenSat a company developing a new medical device technology to help people in their fight against obesity.
More than 600 million people worldwide are suffering from obesity. Growing with 10% per year. Effective treatments like surgery or placement of full size plastic balloons in the stomach are highly invasive and very expensive and therefore only used in 1-2 million cases per year. No existing therapy today is able to treat the millions of patients in need.
PlenSat has developed a "pill" containing a small balloon, made of food grade materials. This balloon is self-inflating in the acidic environment of the stomach to the size of a ping-pong ball. This will survive in the stomach for 3 to 4 weeks. When the balloon finally breaks down due to abrasive forces in the stomach it will pass to the bowels, be digested and leaves the body in the natural way. At any time multiple balloons can be present in the stomach providing 24/7 stomach fullness creating the same weight-loss results like existing therapies, but less invasive, safer, affordable and attainable by millions of people.
PlenSat has completed preclinical studies in the lab and with animals and is currently running first-in-human clinical studies at the Academic Hospital in Maastricht (Netherlands). Looking for 1 million Euro to complete the first phase of the clinical trials and finance the company until end of 2020. Expecting CE approvals and launch of this next "Unicorn" in Europe in 2021.
A simple concept
Multiple Digestible Balloons can stay in your stomach creating a 24/7 fullness and suppressing hunger feelings. After 3-4 weeks the balloons break down and will be naturally digested and removed from the body. The balloons can easily be replaced with new ones as long as needed. During the therapy the patient is losing weight and can work on an improved lifestyle and eating habit.
Competition
Commercial plastic gastric balloons need to be placed (and removed) endoscopically by trained physicians and in hospital environments. The effect of stomach space filling on weight loss will be the same as for PlenSat's Digestible Balloons. However, for safety reasons this balloon is only allowed to be used for maximal 6 months, which is low to reach full effect and change in lifestyle.
The opportunity
Healthcare costs are exploding everywhere and the obesity epidemic is one of the biggest contributors to these costs. Highly invasive and highly expensive therapies as current plastic gastric balloons or bariatric surgery are only used for the worse cases. The majority of the patients suffering from obesity are not helped.
The Digestible Balloons therapy needs very limited physician involvement which makes it affordable and assessable for millions of patients worldwide.