Having spent more than 30 years intimately involved in the development and marketing of medical products (such as wound dressings), I find the history of innovation in the wound care field to be of great interest.

Although wound care dressings have existed for decades, the 1980s were a pivotal time for wound care products. The few wound dressing categories that existed were dominated by a few large companies that heavily promoted their technology for the hole in the patient. For instance, ConvaTec pushed their hydrocolloid technology (developed for ostomy applications) against all other substrates and claimed higher healing power versus competitors. Smith & Nephew pushed foams, and Carrington championed hydrogels as the best product for wounds.

As medical product companies were devoting more attention to wound care, it soon became apparent that there was more to treating the wound than the wound itself. As a result, their attentions broadened to include skin care and incontinence management, and the major wound care competitors began snapping up the major skin care manufacturers. For example, Calgon Vestal and Sween skin care lines were added to the dressing lines of ConvaTec and Coloplast.

The Rise of Wound Care Product Categories and Perceived Advantages

As wound care dressing categories evolved, so did the role of dressing healing studies. Although these studies had always compared different wound care products from start of treatment to healing, they also began to indicate different product classes’ advantages for different stages of wound healing.

For instance, studies started to indicate that hydrogels might be excellent selections for autolytic debridement of eschar, while alginates or foams might be excellent selections to fill cavities and manage high levels of exudate during the inflammatory phase of deeper wounds. As healing progressed and wound depth decreased with production of granulation tissue, more appropriate product selection might shift to hydrocolloid and eventually transparent films as a secondary and then primary dressing.

Value Prop Priorities: Price and Ease of Acquisition vs. Quality

This evolution soon began to impact the medical supply industry’s landscape. The dominant players began to add several—or all—wound care product categories to their lines as they evolved from specialty product promoters to one-stop-shop providers of all products required for wound care. Consequently, clinics and hospitals could now purchase all categories of dressing from several large providers and bundle their purchases to control cost of acquisition.

As dominant corporations added categories to their lines, the marginal differences between products within a dressing class were rarely considered. Practitioners were exposed to various competing hydrocolloids as the institutional supply contract shifted between major players, and they came to realize that none possessed superior healing benefits over others of similar quality.

Further, the source of the hydrocolloid, foam or other dressings became less important that the cost and ease of acquisition and the selection of products needed by the clinic. Anyone with solid wound care knowledge and good connections with medical product converters could have a product line produced that included the most frequently used dressing classes and the number of “full line” suppliers expanded dramatically.

There’s More Room Than You Think

In such a market, the need for yet another supplier of advanced wound care dressings would appear limited. So, a couple years ago when MediPurpose first asked me if I thought it would be a good idea to introduce a new line, my immediate reaction was to advise that since the market was already saturated with so many established players, MediPurpose’s chances for significant market penetration was minimal.

I suggested that unless they offered a full line of wound care products with high quality that matched the market leaders at a significant cost advantage, they would probably be better served investing time and dollars elsewhere. However, I did agree to take a closer look at what would eventually become their MediPlus™ Advanced Wound Care product line and the process MediPurpose uses to select new medical products for potential investment and development.

A review of each product class and each line item within the class quickly showed that the company had managed to acquire well-made wound care products with the handling characteristics most appreciated in clinical use. Others may be able to supply as broad a product line, but few can match MediPlus’ depth of product line offerings by size and application.

Given they had the required quality and breadth of line, the key remaining issue was whether they could bring the MediPlus brand to market at price points that could encourage customers to evaluate the wound care products and switch when performance met expectations. However, MediPurpose has been successful in partnering with truly low-cost and high-quality producers, and it does not incur the expense of a large sales and marketing staff to promote the MediPlus line.

Today in the 2010s when clinic costs are rising and reimbursement has stagnated or declined, the MediPlus Advanced Wound Care line can indeed fulfill dressing requirements while significantly reducing costs and returning profits to its customers.

Sounds like a recipe for success for all.