Field of Expertise

clinical, commercial, medical device, research

Expertise

Giving pain relief to patients is something that the founder of Pplus , Dr Mitra Najafi has always felt passionately about. It is well known that people hate going to the dentist. They dislike the possibility of pain, feel vulnerable and are anxious. Before embarking on her Pplus journey, Dr Najafi was an experienced dental surgeon , qualified from Gothenburg, Sweden. Early in her career she became committed to investing heavily in and delivering pain-free treatment to her clients. She took every opportunity to learn how to make dental treatments as pain-free as possible using laser devices instead of conventional drills, pain-free computer managed anesthesia, CAD- CAM digital dentistry to reduce the number of visits and injections and through completing several specialist courses on pain-free practices. She also specialized in the latest non- surgical anti ageing treatments and work as part time aesthetic consultant with a group of cosmetic surgeons at Transform Cosmetic Surgery Groups for several years. She opened her last successful clinic in 2007. Despite the recession, she grew the business from a very small team of 3 to a large centre of excellence within 7 years and received 16 different national awards and nominations between 2007-2013 including: Dentist of the Year, Clinic of the Year, Best care for nervous patients and the Facial Aesthetic Clinic of the Year. Succeeding at a local level in the UK inspired her to think where else in the world she could offer this passion of giving people pain relief. In 2010 she began her work with the charity: Bridge 2 Aid, where a group of volunteer dental professionals went to the poorest and most remote villages in Tanzania every year. Working under extreme weather and living conditions they performed emergency dental procedures applying pain relief methods to thousands of people. This experience was not only life changing but knowing that she had made such a difference in relieving pain for those she treated led her to ponder how she could use her skills on a global stage. In 2011, Dr Najafi trained in PRP (platelet rich plasma ) technology and started offering it to her clients by way of the injection-based method for facial rejuvenation and to help accelerate post operative healing after surgical procedures, using patient's own blood platelets. The results were impressive and her patients loved this new and safe treatment but complained about the pain caused by the high number of injections in the face. Not only did she start to think how to avoid the use of injections, but also realised the huge commercial opportunity that an injection free topical product based on this pioneering technology could have. To pursue her newfound passion in developing such product, she sold her clinic in 2014 . As she was one of the first clinicians in the UK with experience in this technology, she knew she was ahead of the game. What followed was 4 years of self-funded R&D, at a cost of over £200k to design, develop and patent the first prototypes of such product with her vision being to deliver this innovative and safe technology in a natural, highly personalised and pain-free method at home. She trialed a pilot study with volunteer clients and the ARIAN kit was born, a kit offering topical application of Platelet-Rich Plasma , for patients to take home and use. The patented ARIAN kit is not a pharmaceutical product but it's a combination of 2 medical devices and 1 cosmetic component . Both CE marking and FDA have been applied for and are expected to be completed sometime in January 2023. P-Plus will commercialize the ARIAN kit early 2023. Years of Studies and experiments with various universities, labs and hospitals in the UK, Europe and USA have successfully validated the efficacy of the 3 components. The personalised ARIAN kit: - Can be used by anyone at any age to improve the skin’s elasticity and hydration and to speed up rejuvenation through life maintaining a healthier and softer skin. As PRP improves hydration in the skin, topical application by ARIAN kit will be great for patients with xerosis, eczema and psoriasis with extremely dry skin. - ARIAN uses a brand new type of Collagen peptide as platelet activator. This Collagen related peptide ( CRP-A) was developed by Pplus in collaboration with a group of peptide experts in Germany. - ARIAN is a tool used to use the natural healing properties in patient’s own blood platelets in a topical and non-invasive way. - ARIAN’a activator serum contains CRP-A and a couple of ingredients that increase the permeation of the growth factors ( large molecules ) released after platelet activation transdermally. - ARIAN also contains bespoke sterile Ampoules for Storage of PRP and a patented electronic and software-controlled Storage device for safely storing the PRP ampoules in room temperature at home. The storage device and the ampoules on their own, have recently attracted interest from blood transfusion industry as if manufactured in a bigger size, they can be used for safe storage and transport of platelets from hospitals/ blood transfusion centers to patient’s home/ bedside