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Contego Medical Closes $5.6 Million in Series B Funding

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RALEIGH, N.C., April 17, 2015 /PRNewswire/ — Contego Medical, the first and only provider of the Integrated Embolic Protection™ filter platform for angioplasty balloon and stent delivery catheters, announces the completion of a $5.6 million Series B financing round led by Hatteras Venture Partners, an early stage venture firm with a focus on medical devices, biopharmaceuticals, diagnostics and related opportunities in human medicine. The round also included Mountain Group Partners, Lookout Capital and Medical Mutual.

“Contego Medical’s portfolio of angioplasty balloons and stents embodying the Integrated Embolic Protection™ filter platform represents a breakthrough technology, which we believe will help endovascular interventionalists reduce the risk of stroke and other procedural complications,” said Doug Reed MD, General Partner of Hatteras Venture Partners.  Doug Reed will be joining Contego Medical as a board member.

The company will use the funds to continue to grow its leadership, sales and engineering teams and to develop several new and innovative products with its next-generation Integrated Embolic Protection platform.

“The Paladin device and other devices under development address a multi-billion dollar market, and have the potential to become standards of care in their respective target treatment areas as the combination devices are designed to simplify procedures, improve outcomes and offer cost-effective solutions. We are excited to partner with Hatteras Venture Partners as we continue to expand and commercialize our portfolio of products,” said Ravish Sachar MD, Founder and CEO of Contego Medical.

Contego Medical has expanded its executive team with the appointment of Paul Sanders as Chief Operating Officer, Udayan Patel as Chief Technology Officer, and Alan Bacharach as Contego Medical’s European General Manager. Elizabeth Saylors will continue as VP of Quality and Clinical Affairs. The team’s track record of success brings experienced management and leadership to Contego Medical’s expanding commercialization efforts throughout Europe and globally.

About Contego Medical, LLC

Contego Medical, LLC, based in Raleigh, NC, is developing a portfolio of novel medical devices that address clear unmet needs in the cardiovascular and peripheral vascular space. By integrating filter based embolic protection with treatment on the same platform, Contego Medical’s portfolio of devices are poised to transform the field of cardiovascular and endovascular intervention by making existing procedures safer without increasing complexity or compromising performance. We know embolization occurs with every vascular procedure; Contego Medical’s products enable embolic protection with every procedure. The founders of Contego Medical, Ravish Sachar MD and Jay Yadav MD are physicians, thought leaders, and proven entrepreneurs in the field of endovascular intervention.

The Paladin® Carotid Post-Dilation Balloon with Integrated Embolic Protection is CE-marked in Europe.  The Paladin Carotid Post-Dilation Balloon with Integrated Embolic Protection is not for sale in the US. Visit www.contegomedical.com for more information about the company and its products.

About Hatteras Venture Partners:

Hatteras Venture Partners is a venture capital firm that seeks to transform the practice of medicine through seeding and growing the next generation of innovative healthcare companies. With roughly $300 million under management, Hatteras has invested in over 40 companies since its founding in 2000, with a focus on biopharmaceuticals, medical devices, diagnostics, and healthcare IT companies. While Hatteras has invested throughout the nation, the firm is a leader in the research-driven regions of North Carolina and the Southeastern United States, which are undercapitalized in comparison to New England and California. For more information, visit: www.hatterasvp.com.

SOURCE Contego Medical, LLC

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Poll indicates that Islamophobia exists

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CHARLOTTE, N.C., April 16, 2015 – In a recent poll by Huffington Post nearly 60 percent of the respondents said they were not interested or do not know whether they want to learn more about Islam.

According to the numbers acquired by Huffington, only 7 percent said they had a very favorable opinion of the religion while 14 percent claimed they saw it somewhat favorably. The poll also revealed, not surprisingly, that younger Americans are the group most likely to have positive feelings about the religion.

However, few people based their opinions upon any knowledge of Islam and/or personal relationships with Muslims, even though the bulk of those who participated had negative viewpoints.

Read Also: The more we lie about Islam, the more it resembles the truth

Many of the results followed common perceptions, while others were somewhat surprising. Only one person in 10 said he had ever been to a mosque. Not an unexpected response because there would is usually no need for non-Muslims to visit a mosque and because in many places non-Muslims are forbidden to enter one. For example, only Muslims are allowed in the city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia.

Thirty-nine percent of those who were polled said they would like to learn more about Islam, but 44 percent were not interested. Seventeen percent were unsure, making 61 percent of the answers either negative or not certain.

Further breakdowns indicated that young people and Democrats were more likely to respond positively and had a desire to learn more about Islam. Democrats outnumbered Republicans by 16 percentage points in favorability of Islam and by 13 points in having a desire to learn more.

By age category, between the ages of 18 to 29, 40 percent were unfavorable in comparison to 63 percent favorable in ages between 45 and 64. Those who are older than 65 had a 58 percent favorability tally.

The poll was conceived and conducted by Antonia Blumberg as part of a series in Huffington Post called “Muslim Life in America.” Said Blumberg, “The bottom line is, too many Americans have never even (consciously) met a Muslim person. They have no context for understanding the faith outside of what’s in the news. The aim of the Muslim Life in America series is to lift up the voices and stories of Muslim Americans from all walks of life to contextualize and humanize the faith for other Americans. When you realize the incredible diversity of the Muslim American community, stereotypes just won’t make sense anymore.
Polls will become the lifeblood of journalism in the not-too-distant future as the political parties crank up their speculation machines to see who can be the first to determine the presidential candidates followed by the first media outlet to pick the winner.”

If the purpose of the Huffington Post survey was to generate enough negative numbers to prove that “Islamophobia” is rampant in the United States, then the figures could be interpreted to justify their goal. However, a purely negative set of statistics does not necessarily mean that the majority of Americans are Islamophobic. After all, if Muslims really are trying to kill you, then Islamophobia is nothing more than reality.

Furthermore, there is a large enough number of examples of actual acts of Islamic extremism and terrorism to completely refute the Huffington Post results as fictional.

The fact that Barack Obama refuses to recognize that Islamic extremism exists is not enough proof to verify Huffington’s conclusions. While Obama has convinced himself beyond any shadow of doubt that he has never been wrong about anything, and while the entire planet recognizes him as the purveyor of all wisdom by being the smartest human being in the world, the Huffington Post poll still cannot override the glaring fact that Islam is, by definition, extreme. Calling opposition to it the made-up name of “Islamophobia” will not make it any less of a reality.

Read Also: Muslim voices demand Islamic reform

Robert Spencer, a noted expert on Islam and founder of Jihad Watch, expresses it best when he responds to Islamic apologists by saying, “They see one of the most brutal, barbaric and bloodthirsty polities in the history of the world call itself the Islamic State, and claim to represent Islam in its purity and fullness. They see all this happening and then people whining about ‘Islamophobia,’ rather than calling for genuine soul-searching and honest reform within the Muslim community.”

The negative statistics compiled by Huffington Post are not an indication of Islamophobic beliefs by the American people. Rather they are a validation that Islam in its current form is a global problem that must be challenged and reformed.

Bob Taylor has been traveling the world for more than 30 years as a writer and award winning television producer focusing on international events, people and cultures around the globe.

Taylor is founder of the Magellan Travel Club (www.MagellanTravelClub.com)

Read more of What in the World and Bob Taylor at Communities Digital News.

Follow Bob on Twitter @MrPeabod

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USDA veterinarian: Bird flu outbreak could be ‘devastating’

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The nation’s poultry industry may have to live with a deadly bird flu strain for several years, which would be “devastating,” the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s chief veterinary officer said Thursday.

Dr. John Clifford also said that while new cases should drop to close to zero once the weather warms up and kills off the virus, there’s “very likely” to be a resurgence this fall when the waterfowl that are natural carriers of avian influenza fly south for the winter.

Clifford spoke on a visit to Minnesota, the state hit hardest by outbreaks that have cost Midwest producers over 2 million turkeys and chickens since early March. He said the fact that the highly pathogenic H5N2 virus has already appeared as far east as southern Ontario means there’s an uncomfortable risk of it spreading to the East Coast where much of the U.S. broiler chicken industry is based.

“If it sticks around and continues it’s going to be very devastating to our poultry industry and our international markets, trade markets, as well as the loss domestically,” Clifford said in an interview with The Associated Press. “That’s why we have to really use this time appropriately to do all that we can to determine how best we can address and prevent introductions in the future.”

Authorities have confirmed H5N2 outbreaks at more than 30 commercial poultry farms in the Midwest, including 22 in Minnesota. All were turkey operations except for one chicken farm in Wisconsin. On Thursday, Wisconsin’s agriculture department officials said two more farms had tested positive for infections in the H5 family, and they expected further tests would show it is H5N2.

Officials say there’s no risk to public health or the food supply. Economists don’t expect the outbreaks to affect retail prices much because the birds that have been killed by the virus itself or euthanized to stop its spread represent less than 1 percent of the 235 million turkeys produced in the U.S. last year.

While some USDA officials have told Minnesota officials the virus could be a problem for three to five years, Clifford said it’s impossible to be certain.

“It could be around that long, and there’s just no way to know for sure,” he said.

Experts believe Minnesota is the epicenter because it’s the top turkey producing state — raising around 46 million turkeys a year — and its thousands of lakes and wetlands naturally attract large numbers of migrating ducks and other waterfowl. Turkeys are most susceptible, but chickens also die from the virus. While waterfowl can carry avian influenza viruses and spread them through their droppings and oral secretions, they don’t usually become sick from them.

The ducks blamed for bringing H5N2 to Minnesota and other Midwestern states migrate through the country’s midsection.

The broiler chicken industry, which produces chickens for meat, is clustered along the East Coast in states such as Georgia, North and South Carolina, Virginia, Delaware and Maryland. Clifford said the waterfowl that brought the virus to an infected farm in southern Ontario are likely from flocks that either migrate along the East Coast or intermingle with flocks do.

The USDA has sent about 60 people to Minnesota to reinforce the state’s response. State officials have asked U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to ensure that enough funding remains available. Clifford estimated that the USDA has already spent $20 million to $30 million to reimburse farmers for birds that were euthanized and on other costs. He also said the secretary has the authority to provide additional emergency funding, and it’s been requested as the agency gears up for a new round this fall.

The federal government is also working to limit the harm from export bans imposed by around 40 countries that are already hurting both the turkey and chicken industries, which combined export more than $5 billion worth of products annually, Clifford said.

“We’ve already lost hundreds of millions of dollars in those markets,” he said

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Habitat festival planned Saturday in Dillsboro

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The first Habitat for Humanity Spring Bloom and Build Festival will be held Saturday, April 18, from 2 until 7 p.m. at the Great Smoky Mountain Railroad Depot in Dillsboro.

Fifty-two students from the Tourism Planning and Development class at Western Carolina University are producing the festival.

Admission is free, but there will be a charge of 25 cents for some of the children’s activities.

A variety of food and drinks will be available – student groups will be cooking hamburgers and hot dogs, Mad Batter will have its food truck there and other drinks and snacks will be for sale.

A silent auction will run throughout the event as well, featuring items such as gift baskets, dinner certificates to local restaurants, getaway stays at local inns and a new gas grill donated by the local Lowe’s store.

Habitat for Humanity will have demonstration and information booths, and students are creating a Habitat Re-Store “Pop-Up” Store for the event, which will feature a variety of items from the county’s Habitat Re-Store.

Children’s activities include decorating a flower pot and planting seeds to take home, face-painting, a craft table, a game booth and a cupcake walk.

Jackson County Farmers Market vendors will be on hand to sell produce, plants and more.

Entertainment will be provided by Travers Brothership from Asheville. The band describes their music as alternative, alternative soul and funk/rock ’n’ roll and will play from 4 to 6 p.m.

The festival is a community education and fundraising event to support the efforts of Habitat for Humanity in Macon and Jackson counties. It also supports WCU’s ongoing outreach efforts to support Dillsboro businesses. Carroll Brown teaches the class responsible for planning the festival and has been instrumental in working with the community to provide students with real-world experience. Mary Borse is assisting with the class as a festival coordinator.

The idea for the festival came when Habitat for Humanity groups from both counties approached WCU for help in raising awareness for the programs.

In addition to building new houses, Habitat does extensive outreach work in renovating and improving existing houses. One goal of the festival is to showcase opportunities for volunteer work with Habitat. Students also wanted to work with the Dillsboro Merchants Association to find ways to use the festival to support Dillsboro businesses.

To plan the festival, students chose a committee that would provide them with experience in an area they felt would benefit their future career interests.

The five committees are:

• Vendors – responsible for coordinating food vendors and nonprofit groups that will be cooking and serving food at the event;

• Entertainment and Activities – responsible for the overall planning of entertainment and activities at the event, including music, dance lessons, children’s activities, education and demonstration booths, the Habitat “Pop-Up” Store and the silent auction;

• Fundraising – responsible for soliciting sponsors for the event and donations for the silent auction;

• Marketing and Promotion – created the logo for the event, designed promotional material and planned press releases and a social media marketing campaign;

• Logistics – responsible for securing all permits for the event, coordinating parking and securing all physical needs, including tents, tables, stage and more, and coordinating volunteers at the event.

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Restore tax credit for preservation

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The N.C. Senate should join the House of Representatives in restoring the historic preservation tax credit.

The Republican-controlled General Assembly ended the program effective New Year’s Day, part of an effort to remove economic incentive programs that favored specific industries. The state’s film tax credit program was another victim of the purge.

Area lawmakers are hoping to replace the film-tax credits with a grant program more generous than the current program, which has a $10 million cap. This fiscal year’s program closed after helping just three projects, including the Wilmington-based “Under the Dome” TV series.

Representatives under the dome in Raleigh — actually working in a flat-roofed General Assembly building next to the historic domed state Capitol — voted 98-15 on March 26 to reinstate the tax credits for historic preservation.

Senators parked the bill in the Ways and Means committee. Whether it passes in the Senate, or even emerges from that committee, is anyone’s guess.

Gov. Pat McCrory visited a historic house in New Bern recently to press for a renewal of the preservation credits. McCrory, a Republican who was formerly mayor of Charlotte, has been a champion of the program.

Before they were eliminated, the historic preservation tax credits had been used in 90 of the state’s 100 counties, rich and poor, urban and rural, according to the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources. Susan Kluttz, head of that department, joined McCrory on the New Bern trip.

Since 1998, some 2,484 historic projects have been completed in the state, creating more than $1.6 billion in private investment.

Tax credits help builders recoup some of the costs of renovations and thus encourage preservation of our architectural heritage.

Historic preservation helps drive tourism as historic restorations and downtown areas often act as a draw for visitors. Investing in blighted downtowns by renovating historic empty buildings can help reverse crime and spur economic vitality.

It could help pave the way for Jacksonville to take the same road as downtown Wilmington. In the Port City, buildings that once housed X-rated movie businesses and rough hangouts in the late 1960s and early 1970s have given way to offices, shops and restaurants.

The tax value of renovated buildings is higher, providing needed revenue to cities.

We urge senators to restore the valued historic preservation tax credits so we can all learn to appreciate the rich architectural heritage our forebears have bequeathed us and benefit from its reclamation. Such credits benefit the whole community.

A version of this editorial first appeared in the Wilmington Star-News, a Halifax Media Group newspaper.

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Review: Scott Eastwood finds a groove with ‘The Longest Ride’

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Fleeting nudity is the only thing that separates “The Longest Ride” from most Lifetime TV movies. But, as Nicholas Sparks’ extravaganzas go, it’s not too bad.

Mixing generations (as he did in “The Notebook”), Sparks shows how opposites can attract – and thrive.

Clint Eastwood’s son, Scott, plays a bull rider who’s one concussion away from disaster. He falls for an art student (Britt Robertson) who hasn’t really thought about life on a ranch. (In other words, this is the plotline of this year’s “Bachelor” episodes.)

While on a date, the two come across a wrecked car. Inside: an old man (Alan Alda, for heaven’s sake) who wants a rattan box of letters saved. Naturally, the kids aren’t going to leave the letters alone, so while he’s recovering, Robertson starts reading and learns about his relationship with his wife. That cues plenty of flashbacks and a story that sort of parallels her own.

Alda, we learn, can’t father children. Rather than give a good man up, his wife throws herself into art collecting and becomes something of a guardian to one of her students. She teaches him about art and comes oh-so-close to adopting him.

Meanwhile, back on the ranch, Eastwood continues to defy orders and ride bulls. He moves up in the national standings, too, and has to make some big decisions before audience members start crying.

Directed by George Tillman Jr., “The Longest Ride” has more than a few handkerchief moments. It gets them from Jack Huston and Oona Chaplin (as the younger, sepia-toned Alda and his wife); it lands them with Eastwood and Robertson saying goodbye.

The best waterworks, though, are saved for the end when the old man reveals his way of reuniting his young friends.

Thankfully, Eastwood’s character isn’t some drifter with a shady past that needs revealing. He’s a pleasant young man who just wants to provide for his mom (a very good Lolita Davidovitch). Eastwood looks an awful lot like his dad, but he’s not as guarded or reticent to speak.

Robertson is fine, too, although she could have been replaced by any number of women on ABC Family or The CW.

Alda goes too far with his ailment, but he serves the story and gets a good chunk of the film’s narration.

“The Longest Ride” features a few eight-second rides, a steamy bedroom scene and enough North Carolina landscape to help the state’s tourism. But this isn’t a big stretch for Sparks or anyone else involved.

It’s just a pleasant romance that even boyfriends and husbands won’t mind sitting through.

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GUEST VIEWPOINT: Statesville slowly losing its luster

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Posted: Friday, April 17, 2015 10:09 am
|


Updated: 10:11 am, Fri Apr 17, 2015.

GUEST VIEWPOINT: Statesville slowly losing its luster

By Anna Cochran

Statesville Record Landmark

Imagine this. It’s the year 1980. You are 18. You are going out on a double date in Statesville with your best buddy and their date, and there are so many things to choose from. You could go play a couple rounds of putt-putt at Newtowne Miniature Golf and then go see a movie at Newtowne Cinemas. Maybe afterward, you could shop around at the new Signal Hill Mall or go cruising up and down East Broad Street and see all your friends. This is the typical Friday night of the charming, small-town teenager.

A few decades ago, being young in Statesville was an attractive idea. Ever since this, the small-town, picturesque Statesville is turning into a dilapidated, small-minded ghost town right before our very eyes.

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Friday, April 17, 2015 10:09 am.

Updated: 10:11 am.

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PGI Specialty Materials Completes Acquisition of Dounor

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CHARLOTTE, N.C., April 17, 2015 /PRNewswire/ — PGI Specialty Materials, Inc. today announced that it has completed its acquisition of Dounor S.A.S., a French manufacturer of materials used in hygiene, healthcare and industrial applications. As a result of the acquisition, PGI will integrate all of Dounor’s technologies and capabilities to help drive the growth of its personal care segment as it delivers innovative solutions for European customers.

As a world leader in specialty materials for infection prevention, personal care and high-performance solutions, PGI is always seeking new ways to strategically grow its business in these critical segments and better serve the needs of its global customers. Acquiring Dounor, which has built a strong business in the personal care segment in Europe, adds critical capabilities to PGI’s offerings while enabling the company to leverage Dounor’s key location to serve customers in the region.

“Dounor’s acquisition reinforces our European specialties portfolio and helps us to better serve our Northern European customers, who are critical to our business,” said Jean-Marc Galvez, President, PGI EMEA. “Adding Dounor to our already strong EMEA presence provides us with even greater ability to provide our world-leading specialty materials to our customers.”

“Dounor’s innovation in providing leading personal care products, specifically in the fast-growing adult care category, complements our strong offerings to customers globally,” said J. Joel Hackney Jr., CEO, PGI. “We are very excited to welcome all Dounor employees into the PGI family.”

Click here to learn more about PGI’s innovative products and technologies.

About PGI Specialty Materials, Inc.
PGI Specialty Materials, Inc. is one of the world’s leading developer, producer and marketer of specialty materials used in infection prevention, personal care and high-performance solutions. With 23 locations in 14 countries, an employee base of approximately 4,750 employees and the broadest range of process technologies in the nonwoven’s industry, PGI is a global supplier to leading consumer and industrial product manufacturers. PGI’s manufacturing facilities are strategically located near many key customers. We work closely with them to provide engineered solutions to meet increasing demand for more sophisticated products.

SOURCE PGI Specialty Materials, Inc.

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Short-term relief for small employers reimbursing employee premiums

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But Significant Penalties Loom if You Don’t Stop Soon! 

For nearly two years now, the IRS has been explaining that employers are no longer permitted to reimburse employees for premiums the employees paid for individual health insurance coverage. 

Despite the IRS’s efforts, these arrangements continue to be marketed to employers (perhaps under a mistaken belief that prior guidance did not apply to arrangements that reimbursed only individual insurance premiums). Regardless of the reason, the IRS has again clarified that an arrangement that reimburses employees for health insurance premiums is a group health plan subject to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) mandates. 

As we previously reported, these employer payment plans generally do not meet the requirements of ACA. Employers who maintain these non-compliant plans are liable for a federal excise tax of $100 per day, per employee. That’s $36,500 per employee, per year! 

However, there is good news for small employers—the IRS just provided short-term relief to any employer who is not an “applicable large employer”. “Applicable large employer” is defined in the ACA, and generally means an employer with at least 50 full-time employees (including full-time equivalents). These small employers will not be liable for the excise tax merely because they offer an employer payment plan for any period before July 1, 2015. After June 30, 2015, even small employers will be liable for the excise tax. 

If you have an arrangement that conditions the receipt of cash or any benefit on employees electing other health insurance, you should review that arrangement to ensure it does not run afoul of the ACA requirements.

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Safe Kids event scheduled

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A program promoting child safety will be held this month at the North Carolina Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores.

Safe Kids North Carolina and the Office of the State Fire Marshal are partnering with the aquarium, the Pine Knoll Shores police and fire departments, and Nationwide Insurance to celebrate Safe Kids Day 2015.

Activities are scheduled from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. April 18 at the aquarium.

Safe Kids Day 2015 is a nationwide initiative to prevent unintentional childhood injuries, save lives and celebrate kids. Safe Kids North Carolina, led by the N.C. Department of Insurance, will be providing education to parents, caregivers and children about preventable injuries and child safety. Free giveaways and activities will be available to children.

For more safety tips and information about Safe Kids North Carolina, visit ncsafekids.org.

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