Startup Pacify Medical Technologies Makes Skin Spray To Treat Burn Injuries Quickly

Manasi Saraf Joshi

Pune, 28th September 2021: Here’s good news for all those who have suffered burn injuries. Now, with the help of Skin Spray, burn injuries can be treated quickly in case of emergency. A patent has been filed in multiple countries for the novelty of the idea.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA has supported the project.

A novel device is the brainchild of young Saiprasad Poyarekar of Pacify Medical Technologies Pvt Ltd, Mumbai. He earlier worked as a project assistant at the College of Engineering, Pune (COEP) Biomedical Engineering and Technology Incubation Centre (BETiC). A master degree holder, the idea to develop Skin Spray came up as he had seen death in his family due to burn injuries.

Speaking to Punekarnews.in, Poyarekar said, “Generally by grafting the healthy skin, burn injuries upto 30% to 40% Total Body Surface Area (TBSA) can be treated, but after that, it is very difficult to save a person with over 50% TBSA of injuries. Thus, there has been a huge demand for skin transplantation in our country which sees over 10 lakh burn cases every year. And there are only 300 hospitals that treat burn injuries in the country which are located in big cities.”

He added, “When I was working as a project assistant at COEP-BETiC, there was a demand from Sassoon General Hospital (BJMC) to work on this problem statement. Thus along with Dr Nikhil Panse, we started working on this project.”

Elaborating about the product he says, today, the best option is skin grafting, which allows donor skin of X to be processed using skin mesh technology into a graft covering 4X of the burn area which, because of the limited area that can be transplanted yields the need to perform multiple surgeries for large burn wound and use temporary dressings while waiting for donor skin site to regenerate.

“Thus, there is a need for new technology capable of covering large wounds with limited donor area of healthy skin, which if solved, would have the impact of avoiding the need for multiple surgeries and high infection rates, increased scar formation and contractures that result from temporary dressing affecting many of the 10 lakhs burn injuries annually in India”, he added.

“Unlike conventional skin mesh grafting which covers 4X wound area, our technology covers 30X wound area which saves time and money for both patients and hospitals by reducing surgery time and accelerating healing, thus solving the global problem of skin transplantation”, he said.

Prizes and Accolades 

•Skin Spray Gun device” conceived, designed, and developed at COEP won the first prize during Dr APJ Abdul Kalam International Innovation Conclave 2021 (AKIIC-2021). The international Conclave was hosted by Chandigarh University in association with the Department of Science & Technology, Government of India, during 3rd-4th September 2021 and had a participation of about 5000 participants from 30 countries.

• Winner under the healthcare start-up segment at the annual 3D Experience forum of Dassault Systems held on 15th & 16th September 2021.

• Selected by TiE Mumbai as one of the two start-ups to showcase at their annual event IIMpact Healthcare Summit 2021 event.

Project mentors and team members

An Epidermal Suspension Spray Device -A device to spray Skin-Pieces (Skin Gun)” under the guidance of Dr Nikhil Panse, Plastic Surgeon, B. J. Medical College, Pune, CoEP professors Dr Sandip Anasane and Director Prof BB. Ahuja from 2017 to 2019.

Currently, he runs his start-up “Pacify Medical Technologies Private Limited” with two team members Anmol Zimare and Rayyan Ramrajkar and is supported by DBT, BIRAC (Government of India) and MeitY, Government of India.