In-Licensing

For 17 consecutive years, Children's Hospital Boston has been rated one of the nation's top hospitals specializing in pediatric care, according to a survey by U.S. News & World Report. The Pain Treatment Service at Children's Hospital in Boston has become a referral center for children with many types of neuropathic pain.

Dr. Charles Berde, Chief of the Division of Pain Medicine at Children’s Hospital Boston and Professor of Anesthesia (Peds) at Harvard Medical School, a co-inventor of a key patent in this agreement, is one of the country's leading experts on pain in children. He has received several awards and honors for his pioneering work in pediatric pain relief, including the 2003 Scientific Achievement Award of the Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy Syndrome Association. He was profiled as one of Time Magazine's “Heroes in Medicine" in 1997.

This collaboration strengthens and expands WEX’s pipeline in TTX based pain management by bringing in CHB’s patented technology for prolonged local anesthesia. It is a prestige to work with the experts in CHB and Harvard Medical School. The sponsored research program with Dr. Berde has the potential to attract government funding.

Local anesthetics containing amino ester and amino amide have limited duration of action, (too short to relieve most postoperative pain), and low potency, (requiring millimolar concentrations for effectiveness). Therefore, repeated administration or catheter infusions are required if a clinical effect is desired for longer than 4 to 6 hours. A number of naturally occurring toxins (such as tetrodotoxin or TTX) exhibits potent analgesia at much lower loses by blocking conduction of nerve impulses. Combinations of TTX and other local anesthetics synergistically prolong the nerve blockade, resulting in local anesthesia lasting up to ten hours. 

 

“Local anesthetic formulations” US Patent No. 6,326,020 (2001).