New Study Reaffirms Quick-Med’s NIMBUS® Technology
Poses No Threat of Bacterial Resistance
Innovative Technology Provides a New Level of Assurance in
Addressing a
Growing Global Danger
Gainesville, Florida – November 18, 2008 – Quick-Med Technologies, Inc. announced
today that Dr. Albina Mikhaylova, Senior Scientist at Quick-Med, presented conclusive
evidence at the Symposium on Skin and Wound Care that the Company’s patented
NIMBUS® antimicrobial technology poses no threat of bacterial resistance. The findings,
presented in a podium session at this leading meeting of wound care practitioners, are in
sharp contrast to known resistance issues with leading antibiotics that have allowed
soaring hospital acquired infection rates seen worldwide.
The new study examined the propensity of NIMBUS antimicrobial barrier material to
induce bacterial resistance. The testing of the survivors of each of ten consecutive
generations of E. coli exposed to NIMBUS, the highly charged, substrate-bonded
antimicrobial, revealed no change in bacterial resistance and consistently demonstrated
the original high antimicrobial efficacy of the NIMBUS treated substrate. This finding
comes at a time when public concern for the risk of serious infections from exposure to
such bacteria as Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA) and Vancomycin
Resistant Enterococcus (VRE) is increasing because these highly resistant bacteria are
proving to be increasingly refractory to successful therapy.
Dr. Gregory Schultz, Professor, Institute for Wound Research at the University of
Florida, Past President of the Wound Healing Society, and scientific consultant to Quick-
Med, has observed that “NIMBUS poses no danger of bacteria developing resistance or
of releasing toxic material into the wound and impeding the healing process. It is a novel
technology: bonded and effective even in high concentrations of body fluids.”
Medical treatment with antibiotics for unnecessary therapy has come under increasingly
frequent scrutiny by physicians and other care-givers as a consequence of their concern
for the increasing risk of nosocomial and community acquired infections from resistant
bacteria such as MRSA and VRE. Dr. Mikhaylova noted that the biomedical literature supports the theory that the chemistry
of NIMBUS barrier materials precludes the development of resistance for three reasons:
high charge density, molecular size, and the permanent bond of the antimicrobial to the
substrate. These factors account for the unlikely potential of the microbicide to enter the
bacterial cell protoplasm or to fall below the minimum level of active agent required to
kill bacteria, both of which are necessary for the cell to develop resistance. The results of
this ground-breaking work are being summarized in a research paper for publication.
NIMBUS technology is currently undergoing market clearance review by the U.S. Food
and Drug Administration on its De Novo process, a pathway established by FDA for new,
low risk technologies where there is no predicate device.
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