LLC (the “Company”) is a Sarasota, FL. based medical device company that has developed what believes to be a valuable addition to tissue repair and tissue attachment devices. 
-knotless tissue repair and attachment solution devices, pronounced Zip and say the letter “E”, allow for rapid and easy repair in minimally invasive surgical procedures where the surgeon is working in small spaces or through small incisions using an arthroscope.
The device allows the surgeon to repair the tissue without having to tie knots in tight spaces-quick and simple. It may not replace every indication to tie surgical knots but has the potential to replace many knot tying repair indications and affords your surgeon the opportunity to combine the self-locking surgical button/capture with knot tying techniques.
It is like a Zip-Tie or cable wrap, with which you bind electric or electronic cables- it is a surgical button that travels down a suture and locks from moving in the opposite direction. It is a self-locking surgical button which can act like a tack and creates increased surface contact area for tissue healing. It spreads out the forces over the contact surface area as a washer does with a bolt. Since many tissue repair indications include placing tissue onto a flat surface it acts like a tack holding a rug to the floor.
And it is fast.
Dr. Bennett, a Sarasota based orthopedic surgeon, believes that Ziptek’s technology development platform has the potential to completely revolutionize today’s soft-tissue repair industry and could change the way minimally-invasive surgical tissue repair is performed for years to come.
Ziptek LLC makes (say “Zip” and then say the letter ”E”) knotless tissue repair and attachment devices. These devices are developed for tissue-to-tissue and tissue-to-bone repair and can be used in minimally invasive techniques or in open surgeries. The device utilizes an engineered mechanism whereby an absorbable surgical “button”, or “capture”, slides along a suture with protuberances and is prevented from moving back along its path in the opposite direction. It uses a technology similar to a ZipTie. This avoids the need to tie knots in small spaces, and creates superior contact with the tissue to be repaired compared to other devices currently on the market.
This device falls into the general category of bone anchors. Regular bone anchors require a surgeon to place a knot, while newer knotless devices engage the suture by friction hold. Ziptek LLC’s technology does not crimp the suture, but employs a ZipTie type mechanism found in a surgical button. The surgical button disperses pressure across a larger surface area to help prevent the suture from tearing out through the tissue. This type of tearing is the most common failure mechanism found with all devices currently on the market. Studies have shown that the addition of the button to the rotator cuff repair device stabilizes the tissue to help prevent this form of failure. Additionally, it creates increased contact surface area, which should allow for better and improved tissue healing while decreasing the rate of non-healing and re-tears.
As tissue heals, with time the transfer of forces should be a gradual one from repair device to tissue, and in the end the repair device should not be sharing any load with the regenerated tissue. This type of repair environment optimizes the potential for complete remodelling and tissue regeneration. Devices presently being utilized on the market are load-sharing and permanent. In contrast to external skin laceration sutures, internal rotator cuff sutures are left in the body, which has the potential to cause damage to the tissue both during and after healing. The capture resorbs into the body.
Ziptek’s management believes once patients understand how the device works, that they (YOU) will ask for a repair by name.
