Verde Environmental Technologies Wins National Contract from NIDA/NIH for Development of Home Drug Deactivation System
MINNEAPOLIS, Sept. 17, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Verde Environmental Technologies of Burnsville, MN has been awarded a Phase 1 SBIR (Small Business Innovation Research) contract by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), a branch of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for the development of an inexpensive at home deactivation system for unwanted abusable psychoactive drugs. The contract (NIDA Ref. N43DA-13-4420) specifies the development of a system that would provide a simple way to safely inactivate and contain unwanted prescription drugs, thereby minimizing the potential for diversion or accidental exposure, and providing a safe and environmentally responsible way to properly dispose of pharmaceuticals.
"This is an important step for our company and for the general public," said Andrew Korey, PhD, Verde's CEO. "We believe that our at-source deactivation strategy for unused drugs will help combat the growing problems of abuse or diversion of drugs from the home," he added. Verde will develop a new product design in their Medsaway® 'single prescription' size format for disposal of unwanted controlled psychoactive prescriptions in pill, liquid, or transdermal dosage forms. As part of the contract, Verde will also conduct user testing, toxicity, and risk assessment evaluations.
The development of a new single prescription size of Medsaway could also expand the company's product offerings in pharmacies and could possibly be co-dispensed with prescriptions.
Disposal of unwanted pharmaceuticals has become a significant problem, causing environmental contamination of groundwater, as well as the significant risk of abuse or misuse of medications from the home. While community take back programs have been successful in accumulating tons of unwanted medications, such programs are expensive, take place infrequently, are inconvenient, and have been shown to only succeed in addressing a minor percentage of total unused drug accumulation. Verde has developed products that allow unwanted medication to be rendered safely inactivated and disposed of in an environmentally acceptable manner. Verde's proprietary Medsorb™ technology uses activated carbon, which is highly effective in adsorbing and firmly binding pharmaceuticals, rendering them inactive, and unrecoverable, and providing for an environmentally sound disposal method.
About Verde:
Verde is a privately held innovative organization, with manufacturing and operations based in Minnesota. Verde products include Medsaway systems (SP, Home, Professional, and XL) and Medsaway ContraPatch™ for safe inactivation of transdermal patches. More information about our products can be found at www.medsaway.com and www.contrapatch.com.
SOURCE Verde Environmental Technologies
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