Pushing Surgery Forward!

When we want to advance into bold new sectors of medicine, what should guide this progress? Nothing inspires the team at Elucent Medical like serving the needs of patients as it finds ways to treat them with the care, dignity, and respect they deserve. Their innovative mindset and commitment to people have seen them named Leading Stereotactic Surgical Navigation System Company, 2022 – USA, in GHP’s 2022’s Global Excellence Awards. We take a closer look at the firm in light of this success.

The world of medicine must constantly move ahead to serve the needs of patients through new techniques and technologies. Evolution in healthcare must address unmet clinical needs through efficient and effective means. The team behind Elucent Medical has made it their mission to ensure that their innovative solutions suit the specific unmet needs of patients and physicians worldwide.

The focus of Elucent Medical has been on delivering physicians the ability to return to the precise location of cancer for treatment with real-time surgical navigation. Based in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, the team targeted the various difficulties associated with breast cancer treatments. Breast cancer affects 1 in every 8 women, given there are 3.9 billion women worldwide breast cancer ranks second in leading cause of death for women. The patients who are faced with a breast cancer diagnosis, leading to a targeted surgical removal treatment are faced with a biopsy and localization done with image guidance. Most undergo an invasive image guided “hook-wire localization” procedure the morning of surgery to assist in locating the tumor which has been the standard of care since the 1970’s. Finding a less intrusive, less painful, and more precise manner of that not only replaced the need for a hook-wire but also enable surgical tools that provided real-time navigation to the surgeon for the exact location for targeted tissue was first and foremost in the minds of the Elucent Medical team. 

To this end, founders Laura King, Lee Gravatt Wilke MD, Fred T. Lee MD, and Dan van der Weide PhD, each brought diverse skills to the table, further enhanced by the talented Elucent Medical team. United under a common goal, the firm has been able to secure impressive success in pushing the boundaries of clinical medicine with innovative technology. Their incredible product, the EnVisio™ Navigation System, redefines wireless navigation to solve the unique challenge presented to them by medical professionals, namely, how to return to a precise location for intervention to deliver a therapy or excise targeted tissue. First-generation navigation technology employs optical “line of sight” concepts or wired solutions that use camera-tracked tools for navigation systems. The innovation behind Elucent Medicine wireless, real-time navigation uses the proprietary SmartClip™ placed inside the body. The SmartClip™ is then able to send its unique signature “voice,” which indicates precisely where the target specimen plus the desired margin of healthy tissue before the surgical intervention. This product is FDA-cleared to remain permanently implanted as a fiducial soft tissue marker should surgery be deemed unnecessary. It’s not just those with breast cancer who can benefit from this new approach. Stereotactic Surgical Navigation also opens the door to treating diseases in soft tissues that lack anatomic landmarks, such as the lung, lymph, and colon.

The SmartClip™ introducer offers patients a painless and unintrusive solution. The location of the SmartClip™ technology enables the EnVisio™ System to navigate the surgeon back to the cancerous tissue. The design of the EnVisio platform is to enable hospitals and physicians to utilize commonly used surgical tools and equipment that integrates with the EnVisio product portfolio further empowering the healthcare team to deliver the very best work on behalf of patients.

In cancer, precision matters, and the need for this exciting, innovative approach to surgery has long been overlooked by companies, with medical practitioners settling for old-fashioned techniques that get the job done but might not deliver the best outcome for the patients. The new perspective offered by Elucent Medical, inspired by remarkable technological advances, has shifted viewpoints showing the incorporation of surgical navigation platforms deliver improved patient outcomes. The EnVisio products bring this advancement to the breast cancer space.

As new developments continue to enter the market, the Elucent Medical team intends to continue its winning strategy of delivering precision navigation for anatomical localization of soft tissue through integration with the surgeons cutting tools modernizing surgical technological solutions. Evolving is no easy task, but the team behind Elucent Medical has made it their mission. With a team of experts from diverse fields of expertise, they have delivered on their innovation, a next-generation navigation system that has enabled physician-guided patient procedures with precision. The dedication to redefining the standard of care to help improve patient lives is evident as the company reported over 5,000 patient procedures performed with EnVisio Surgical Navigation. With such triumphs behind them, it is clear that their success in the Global Excellence Awards is well deserved. We are excited to watch their growth.

For further information please contact Ginger Sanda via email at [email protected]