A novel approach to non-invasive and personalized skin cancer diagnosis

ended

French SME-company DAMAE Medical is facing skin cancer worldwide issue by developing the OCTAV Project, a new approach to dermatological diagnostic based on a disruptive Line-field Confocal Optical Coherence Tomography (LC-OCT) technology, in a novel hand-held imaging device. OCTAV is designed to capture in situ images of the skin layers with a cellular resolution. It is used in conjunction with dermoscopy to provide more accurate diagnosis, leading to fewer biopsies of benign lesions and earlier detection of melanoma (clinical use 1) and non-melanoma skin cancers (clinical use 2). It may also guide the surgery to provide more accurate presurgical margins (clinical use 3), preventing unnecessarily large scars and reducing the risk of recurrence. Correlatively, DAMAE is developing a full software solution, based on a data storage cloud-platform, a computer-aided software designed to assist dermatologists with OCTAV image interpretation, as well as telepathology and patient services. OCTAV device will initially be used by clinicians as a routine easy-handling diagnostic device in public practices (market segment 1). Implementation of OCTAV software will enable its adoption by a much larger market, consisting of private practices dermatologists (market segment 2). The approach will contribute to the development of skin cancer risk patient awareness, while changing the current paradigm through a timely, performant, and non-invasive approach, and releasing the financial burden on the healthcare system. Project OCTAV has successfully completed in 2017 a feasibility phase covered by the SME Instrument Phase 1, resulting in a TRL6 prototype of the technology and a first consolidated atlas of skin cancer clinical images. The main objective of this Phase2 is to scaleup the OCTAV solution to TRL9 through industrialization activities and by achieving a definitive market assessment, the clinical validation and the regulatory approval, before deploying the approach worldwide.