World Health Day

Screening looks for early signs of a developing disease in healthy individuals, when treatment is more likely to be successful. Regular check-ups can help detect various sexually transmitted infections (STIs) such as Chlamydia, gonorrhoea and Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) as well as many types of cancers including prostate, cervical and lung.

Novosanis has over the last few years been exploring the benefits of using first-void urine as a specimen for screening and we have seen great potential.

Taking cervical cancer as an example, urine sampling offers many advantages. Testing urine for HPV, the cause for more than 99 percent of cervical cancer cases, could dramatically increase participation in screening programs. A urine sample is quick, non-invasive and can easily be taken at home by women.

Colli-Pee, our innovative, patented and award-winning medical device, enables first-void urine collection in a simple manner. The unique design of the tool allows easy capture of first-void urine, which contains higher concentrations of DNA and RNA, like from HPV.

Alongside screening, vaccination is vital in the fight against cervical cancer. The HPV vaccine, which prevents infection of especially the most cancerous types of the virus, types 16 and 18, are routinely offered to girls aged 12 to 16 internationally. Impact studies have conducted by WHO in which Colli-Pee was used to assess the baseline of HPV prevalence as well as the impact of HPV vaccination in countries like Rwanda and Bhutan. The results have been published by Franceschi et al and look promising!

VAX-ID, our intradermal drug delivery device can potentially be used to treat cancers, infectious diseases and other immune infections. The easy-to-use injection system, allows targeted drug delivery, improving immune response and offering new prospects for vaccine delivery.

Although we have a long way to reach a world free of infectious diseases and cancers, we believe our innovate medical devices are bringing us one step closer to this dream.