OrthoSon’s ‘surgery down a needle’ ultrasound treatment for back pain gets funding boost

The new treatment could have major impacts on alleviating the burden of back pain on society.  The NHS has cited the condition as the UK’s largest cause of disability, with lower back pain alone accounting for 11% of the nation’s total. OrthoSon draws on research on the economic costs of back pain which reveals annual treatment costs, productivity loss and sick leave associated with back and neck pain exceed $100bn in the US and £12bn in the UK.

The company is targeting patients where pain and disability are caused by degeneration of the intervertebral discs located between vertebrae in the spine. Current treatments such as spinal fusion and disc replacement are extremely costly, highly invasive and show poor outcomes, often leaving patients reliant on long term medication to manage the pain.

OrthoSon’s technology effectively replaces the nucleus (centre) of the patient’s degenerated disc. The process combines high intensity and precision ultrasound, gas-stabilising solid particles and injectable hydrogel, delivered through a small needle directly into the disc. After the particles are injected, externally-delivered focussed ultrasound is used to implode them repeatedly, causing complete breakdown of the nucleus. OrthoSon’s hydrogel is then injected through the original needle, where it cures (sets) to form a replacement nucleus that restores the function of the spinal segment.

The funding extension has been awarded under the Covid-19 Continuity Grant scheme provided by Innovate UK, the UK’s Innovation Agency.  OrthoSon CEO Rich Simmonds said, “Receipt of the Continuity Grant from Innovate UK will allow us to maintain momentum in our Biomedical Catalyst project, generating the prototype and preclinical data needed for the next stages of product development. OrthoSon would like to thank Innovate UK for its ongoing support of our minimally invasive ultrasound-based approach which we expect to revolutionise treatment of crippling lower back and neck pain.”

OrthoSon raised £1.8m seed funding in November 2019 led by Oxford Technology and Innovations EIS Fund (OTIF) and Oxford Investment Consultants, and has received £1.45m to date in grant funding from national innovation agency Innovate UK. The company’s team includes CEO Rich Simmonds, with over 25 years of medical technology experience, and Professor Constantin Coussios FREng, company co-founder and CTO, Director of Oxford University’s Institute of Biomedical Engineering and therapeutic ultrasound expert involved in establishing of Oxford medtech firms OrganOx and OxSonics Therapeutics.

Sources: Lower back or neck pain is the largest cause of disability globally (Global Burden of Disease Study 2015; Lancet 2016; 388: 1603-58) and causes enormous economic burden, with the costs of treatment, productivity loss and sickness leave exceeding $100 billion per annum in the USA (US Spending on Personal Health Care and Public Health, 1996-2013; JAMA 2016;316(24):2627-2646) and £12 billion pa in the UK (Pain 2000 84: 95-103). 

NHS blogpost on UK cause of disability, The National Back Pain Pathway, August 2016.