HepaLife Technologies Inc. added a quartet of prominent liver docs to its advisory board, ahead of planned pivotal Phase III clinical trials for its HepaMate cell-based bioartificial liver system.
The Boston-based device maker said Achilles Demetriou, Fredric Gordon, Philip Rosenthal and John Vierling joined three other MDs on its advisory board.
The four have impressive resumés. Demetriou is president of the University Hospitals system in Cleveland and a professor of surgery and vice dean for clinical affairs at Case Western Reserve University’s School of Medicine. He holds multiple patents stemming from his liver research and is co-inventor of the HepaMate technology.
Gordon is medical director of liver transplantation and director of hepatology at the Lahey Clinic Medical Center in Burlington; Rosenthal is the director of pediatric hepatology, medical director of the pediatric liver transplant program and a professor of pediatrics and surgery at the University of California, San Francisco; and Vierling is professor of medicine and surgery, director of Baylor Liver Health and chief of hepatology at the Baylor College of Medicine and director of advanced liver therapies at St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital in Houston.
All four took part in previous clinical trials of the device, which is “designed to combine blood detoxification with liver cell therapy to provide whole liver function in patients with the most severe forms of liver failure,” according to the company.
The system uses a blood plasma separation cartridge, a bioreactor of porcine liver stem cells, a charcoal column, an oxygenator, circuit tubing and a plasma reservoir to simulate the functioning of a healthy liver with the help of drug detoxification everett wa.