Is it important to physicians to distinguish color tones? Do physcians have an increased ability to see the distinction in pathology the more visual cues they have? Are video-based scopes going to produce a paradigm shift in the marketplace?
IIP > read on here > http://www.lohud.com…
…In a small office at the headquarters of Vision-Sciences Inc., Carlos Babini is showing off the medical-device maker’s latest endoscope technology, known as EndoSheath. Babini, the company’s chief sales and marketing officer, inserts a flexible tube covered with a polymer slip, about the diameter of string of spaghetti, through his nose and down through his throat, while digital-video images of his epiglottis appear on a computer screen just in front of him.
Though the procedure might seem painful, Babini is doing this without any anesthesia and is able to continue talking as images of his vocal chords come into view. The images provide startling detail, the kind that can help doctors determine diseased tissue, he says…
By entering the throat through the nose, Babini explains, physicians can avoid a complication that often arises when the probe is inserted through the patient’s mouth - the gag reflex, which often necessitates sedation and additional time for the procedure. EndoSheath also protects patients from infections and allows for faster turnaround times between patients, since sheathing the flexible probe with a thin polymer cover eliminates the need for time-consuming cleaning and sterilization procedures, he says. It is the transition from fiber-optic images to digital-video technology and the company’s proprietary EndoSheath system that is driving growth at Vision-Sciences, which employs 55 workers at its plant at 40 Ramland Road and expects to create 102 additional jobs during the next several years…
The expansion, which will result in the closing of the company’s Natick, Mass., facility, where the polymer sheaths are manufactured, requires that Vision-Sciences move to larger Rockland offices, which it plans to do by early next year…
The move will shift some 30 jobs from Natick to Orangeburg, but not the people holding those jobs…
Vision-Sciences is getting help from incentives offered through the Rockland Industrial Development Agency, which has granted a sales-tax exemption, estimated to be worth as much as $80,000, on the purchase of equipment and furnishings for the new office. Further, the company is seeking, and will likely be granted, Empire Zone status through a provision in the law that permits job-generating projects to be granted regionally significant project status, even though they are located outside of Rockland’s six Empire Zone districts. Empire Zone incentives allow qualified businesses to operate nearly tax free for up to 10 years. In addition, they may also qualify for wage-tax credits of up to $3,000 a year for each new full-time employee hired into a new position…