Fort Worth-based Eosera Inc., a biotechnology startup specializing in ear care products, announced Monday, Dec. 11, that it will be expanding its offering to nursing home facilities across the nation thanks, in part, to some key partnerships.
“Hearing loss is indeed common among the elderly, but it is also largely avoidable in many cases,” said Esosera co-founder and CEO Elyse Dickerson, in a news release.
“Often, it is a direct result of severe earwax impaction, resulting from failure to keep the ears clean,” Dickerson continued. “In our ongoing conversations with healthcare professionals, we have identified this population as one that truly and urgently needs an effective solution to alleviate the discomfort related to earwax impaction, and they need it on premises.”
According to the 2017 ENT Clinical Practice guidelines, excessive or impacted earwax is present in 1 in every 10 children, 1 in every 20 adults, and in more than half of the elder population.
Additionally, according to the guidelines, up to 36 percent of the developmentally delayed adult population have this problem. The presence of earwax impaction has been associated with hearing loss in these populations.
According to the release, about 18 million people across the nation seek medical care for earwax every year.
To specifically tackle this issue within the geriatric population, Eosera recently partnered with VitalMedix Inc., which sells health care supplies to nursing homes and long-term care hospitals.
“Nursing home residents have a difficult time going to the doctor or audiologist”, said Jeff Gurley, CEO & Founder of VitalMedix, in the release. “In most cases, they rely on caregivers and healthcare professionals to come to them to conduct health screenings and general ear cleaning, including earwax removal.”
“Current consumer products for earwax removal have not been working adequately to dissolve wax,” Gurley continued. “We are delighted to have found Earwax MD and have determined it to be the most valuable product on the market today for ear cleaning.”
By the end of this month, nursing homes and long-term care facilities around the nation will be able to purchase Earwax MD directly from VitalMedix to use in their offices.