Strategic data collaboration taps into national critical care software infrastructure across ~4,500 NHS beds to assess rapid hospital ROI, capacity utilisation, and infection reduction.

Ondine Biomedical Inc. (AIM: OBI), a leader in light-activated antimicrobial therapies to prevent hospital infections, today announces a strategic data and evaluation collaboration with Mela Solutions Ltd. (“Mela Solutions”), who for over 25 years have supported UK healthcare teams and whose Medicus platform is embedded in 90% of National Health Service (“NHS”) intensive care units (“ICUs”). The NHS operates approximately 300 adult critical care units and 5,000 ICU beds, including about 4,000 beds in England.[1]

Under this collaboration, Mela Solutions will customise their data platform to enable participating hospitals to rapidly evaluate Steriwave® nasal photodisinfection against their own historical ICU baseline metrics. By leveraging Mela’s established clinical database footprint across the NHS, participating Trusts can bypass typical data collection delays to rapidly quantify workflow integration, clinical impact, cost savings, and capacity creation. In the first year, the partnership is targeting 6 to 10 hospitals with larger intensive care units (30 or more beds), which together admit up to 20,000 critical care patients a year.

The initiative builds on momentum from Ondine’s Phase 3 LANTERN trial (topline results demonstrated a 40.5% reduction in surgical site infections across 18 Canadian and U.S. hospitals) and the Royal Columbian Hospital’s 227-patient SMURF feasibility study published in Critical Care. The published SMURF study showed that nasal photodisinfection integrated into routine ICU care, delivering a statistically significant reduction in early cumulative nasal pathogen burden (p < 0.01) alongside an observed 39.5% reduction in ICU pneumonia rates.

Carolyn Cross, CEO of Ondine Biomedical, stated: “With recent data showing nearly 16% of ICU patients acquiring a hospital infection [2] and average bed throughput at ~65 patients annually, healthcare-associated infections represent a multi-billion-pound drain on NHS capacity. For NHS hospitals, this rate translates into 8 or more preventable infections per ICU bed every year, extending stays by 9 to 21 days and straining operational budgets. With an NHS critical care bed costing £1,881 per day, [3] and ventilator-associated pneumonia adding nearly £9,000 per patient, [4] effective nasal decolonisation holds the potential for a strong ROI. Preventing ICU-acquired infections may cost-effectively increase effective NHS ICU capacity without requiring additional beds. With the high cost of operating each ICU bed, patient throughput is a key operational performance metric for hospitals and we believe, a key driver for the potential adoption of nasal photodisinfection.”

The UK Health Security Agency (“UKHSA”) sources say that infectious diseases cost NHS secondary care nearly £6 billion annually (2023-2024) and consume over 20% of bed days.[5] By partnering with Mela Solutions, NHS hospital decision-makers can verify Steriwave’s cost-benefit ratio in weeks rather than years, significantly shortening the sales and evaluation cycle for commercial deployment.

Edward Willans, Managing Director of Mela Solutions, commented: “Mela’s role is to empower NHS critical care teams to convert their raw data into actionable clinical and financial insights. We are pleased to work with Ondine to show how our established ICU data infrastructure can accelerate the evidence-based evaluation and adoption of proven clinical innovations across the NHS.”

Carolyn Cross, CEO of Ondine Biomedical, added: “Partnering with Mela gives us an efficient, data-driven pathway across NHS ICU infrastructure. This data collaboration equips NHS Trusts with the local evidence needed to evaluate rapid deployment in approved markets. By demonstrating measurable financial and clinical value directly through the NHS’s own data systems, we can more effectively target this substantial critical care market.”