Deccan Healthcare raises Rs.15-Cr from Nexus Ventures

Deccan Healthcare, an innovative products company in the Indian health and wellness market, has received a Rs 15 crore investment from Nexus Venture Partners.

Deccan Healthcare has developed, through intensive R&D, a variety of nutraceutical products which boost immunity and address chronic ailments. The key products include a flaxseed-based vegetarian Omega-3 which they sell under the OxyFlax and Nulife-ISB brand. It is useful for cardiac care, bone health, diabetes prevention, and is also anti carcinogenic and anti-inflammatory.

Speaking about the funding, Mr Minto Gupta, Founder & CEO, Deccan Healthcare said, “We at Deccan Healthcare are happy to be associated with Nexus Venture Partners. The funding will help us enhance our R&D efforts and our expansion plans. Deccan is launching a variety of nutraceuticals addressing specific life-style problems and will also explore export opportunities.”

Sandeep Singhal of Nexus Venture Partners said, “The Indian nutraceuticals market is over a billion dollars growing at 30-40% per annum. Mr. Gupta is a passionate entrepreneur who has built Deccan into a leader in the Omega-3 market and is now expanding into a variety of nutritional supplements.”

Manoj Gupta

Vitamins boost pharma growth

Vitamins and minerals are among the drug therapeutic groups showing the fastest growth in sales in the domestic pharmaceutical market over the past year, show data from the research company ORG-IMS.

There are two main reasons preferred. One, Indians have a growing appetite for supplements. Two, these are mostly products out of government price control.

According to the August MAT (moving annual total) data, the vitamins, minerals and nutrients segment is the only group among the top five money-spinning therapeutic areas with growth in both volume as well as value terms on a year-on-year basis. ORG MAT data gives the annual sales of each therapeutic group for the September 2008–August 2009 period and compares it with the September 2007–August 2008 period.

While the vitamin segment grew 7.5 per cent in volumes (as against a 0.1 decline the previous year) and 10.3 per cent in value (against 5.4 per cent growth last year), all other segments showed a decline in growth. The top five revenue-generating therapeutic groups in the Rs 33,272.7 crore domestic market are anti-infective, cardiac, respiratory, pain management and vitamins.

Incidentally, the vitamins, minerals and nutrients segment is the only area (among the ones tracked by ORG-IMS) where five of the top 10 players are foreign multinational firms. While the market leader is the Indian subsidiary of Germany’s Merck Ltd, the other foreign MNCs among the top 10 are GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Pfizer, Novartis and Abbott.

Merck Ltd is the leading player with Rs 195 crore of business in 2009 (MAT August). Value growth, 7.3 per cent in 2008, became 13.8 per cent in 2009. Unit growth was huge, from a decline of 1.1 per cent in 2008 to a 19.1 per cent rise in 2009.

Pfizer’s vitamin business grew 15.1 per cent in value terms during the year, as against the four per cent decline recorded in MAT August 2008. The sale this year was Rs 142 crore, as against Rs 123.3 crore in 2008. The volume growth was an impressive 9.6 per cent as against a decline of 1.7 per cent last year.

The only Indian company whose vitamin sales also grew significantly during the period was Elder Pharma, from Rs 102.6 crore to Rs 120.3 crore, indicating a growth of 17.3 per cent in value terms as against 1.4 per cent negative growth in 2008. Volume-wise, the growth was 17 per cent as against 0.5 per cent the previous year.

Indian companies among the top 10 are Wockhardt, Raptakos Brett, Piramal Healthcare and Alkem.

Industry experts see the growth in the vitamin segment as part of a global trend. “It was widely expected that the vitamins and health supplement segment will see a decline in sales during the financial crisis. But contrary to expectations, the segment has done well globally, showing that people did not want to fall sick. That is the reason for the volume growth for vitamins in India, too”, Sujay Shetty of PricewaterhouseCooper said.

As for the value growth, “Some companies have succeeded in reformulating their vitamins to bring them out of price control”, he explained.

Fatty Fish May Cut Prostate Cancer Risk

March 24, 2009 -- Men who eat salmon and other fish high in omega-3 fatty acids on a regular basis have a decreased risk for developing advanced prostate cancer, new research suggests.

The association was most pronounced among men believed to have a genetic predisposition for developing aggressive prostate cancer.

Men in the study who ate one or more servings of fatty fish a week were found to have a 63% lower risk for developing aggressive prostate cancer than men who reported never eating fish, study co-researcher John S. Witte, PhD, tells WebMD.

The study is not the first to find that men who eat fatty fish have a lower risk for the most deadly forms of prostate cancer. But Witte says clinical trials are needed to show that eating foods high in omega-3 fatty acids actually lower risk of aggressive prostate cancer.

The study appears in the April issue of Clinical Cancer Research.

"There is a lot of evidence that omega-3 fatty acids protect against heart disease and other diseases by targeting inflammation -- and that may be what is going on here," Witte says.

Omega-3 and Prostate Cancer

The study by Witte and colleagues from the University of California, San Francisco, included 466 men with aggressive prostate cancer and 478 men without the cancer.

The men were asked to fill out food-frequency questionnaires. Genetic analysis was also performed to identify variants of the Cox-2 gene, which helps regulate inflammation within the body. A certain variant of this gene is also known to increase the chance of developing prostate cancer.

The analysis revealed that men who ate little to no fatty fish and had a specific Cox-2 variant were five times more likely to develop advanced prostate cancer.

But men with the highest intake of omega-3 fatty acids -- equivalent to one or more servings of fatty fish a week -- had a significantly reduced risk for advanced disease, even when they carried the Cox-2 variant.

"The increase in risk associated with having the Cox-2 variant was essentially reversed in men who ate fish one or more times a week," Witte says.

Clinical Trials Needed

Omega-3 researcher Jorge Chavarro, PhD, of Harvard Medical School tells WebMD that the findings are consistent with his own studies of omega-3 and prostate cancer.

In a 2007 study, Chavarro and colleagues with the Harvard School of Public Health reported a 41% reduction in prostate cancer risk among men who ate higher levels of omega-3s than men with the lowest intake.

In separate studies, the Harvard team found that men who ate fatty fish before being diagnosed with prostate cancer and after their diagnosis were less likely to die of the disease.

Chavarro's research also suggests that omega-3 is particularly protective against the most aggressive prostate cancers.

Clinical Trials Needed continued...

He tells WebMD that this supports the growing belief that prostate cancer is a more complex disease than previously thought.

"We call everything prostate cancer, but clinically aggressive cancers and more localized, benign cancers may be two very different diseases," he says. "In the past we have studied overall disease. But it may be that the effects of fish and other anti-inflammatory interventions, like Cox-2-targeting drugs, affect only aggressive disease."

Roswell Park Cancer Institute President and professor of oncology Donald Trump, MD, tells WebMD that there is enough evidence suggesting a protective role for omega-3 against prostate cancer to justify a large trial studying whether eating a diet rich in omega-3s -- or even taking omega-3 supplements -- can actually lower risk of prostate cancer.

"This is a very nicely done study, but we definitely need a clinical trial," he says. "These results suggest that we may be able to identify men who will be most likely to benefit and least likely to benefit from this intervention."

Fish rich in omega-3 fatty acids include:

• Halibut
• Herring
• Mackerel
• Oysters
• Salmon
• Sardines
• Trout

One Fish, Two Fish: Counting Your Omega-3s

If you're wondering if you're getting enough Omega-3 in your diet, a blood test can help you decide if you need to eat more fish. The Omega-3 index blood test measures the good fats in your red-blood cells, and grades you on your related risk of heart disease. Some doctors say the test is a useful motivator, while others say most people need to focus first on basics such as losing weight and eating vegetables..

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Omega-3 fatty acids are healthy fats that have been found to reduce the risk of death from heart disease. A growing body of research also suggests they may also boost memory and combat arthritis. The American Heart Association recommends eating fatty fish at least twice a week, and some doctors also recommend fish-oil supplements.

The Omega-3 index test is given by a blood draw in a doctor's office or a finger-stick test at home. It measures the amount of two heart-healthy fats—docosahexaenoic and eicosapentaenoic acids, or DHA and EPA, deposited in the membranes of red-blood cells after consuming fish or other foods rich in Omega-3s.

So far, the test results aren't standardized among laboratories, so a result from one lab can't be compared with another, scientists say. OmegaQuant Analytics, a laboratory owned by Omega Biostatus LLC, of Sioux Falls, S.D., in January began offering a proprietary test it calls the HS-Omega-3 Index, named for co-developers William Harris, the founder of OmegaQuant, and German scientist Clemens von Schacky. The lab aims to make the test a national standard.

The test results state your level of Omega-3 fatty acids as a percentage of total fatty acids. Under 4% in OmegaQuant's test is considered "undesirable," or an elevated heart-disease risk, and over 8% is "desirable." The gradings are based on a 2004 paper, written by Dr. Harris and Dr. Schacky, which looked at a number of heart-disease studies using various types of Omega-3 blood testing and calculated what the studies' subjects would have scored if they had gotten the company's test instead. The grading will likely be revised based on direct evidence from 10 research studies now evaluating the test's link to a variety of health outcomes, Dr. Harris says.

Since blood cells live an average of four months in the body, the test results reflect eating habits over the past one to four months, Dr. Harris says. A typical test result for Americans is 3% to 5%, he adds. A reporter received a value of 7.4%, which was graded as "intermediate"; a printout accompanying the result recommended that she eat more oily fish, or take a fish-oil supplement.

The Cooper Clinic, of Dallas, which this summer began offering OmegaQuant's test to its patients, says it has been a useful educational tool. A patient may say he or she eats fish now and then "and then get the result back and say 'Oh, yeah, I guess I'm not eating it as often as I think,' " says Cooper Chief Executive Tedd Mitchell.

A person's test results depend not just on the amount of Omega-3 fatty acids they eat, but also on genetics—with some people needing to eat more foods with healthy fats to achieve a favorable result.

"It's a good test," but most people have other, more pressing health issues they should focus on first, says Stephen Kopecky, a cardiologist at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. Omega-3 blood levels are less important than quitting smoking, exercising regularly, maintaining a healthy weight and eating five fresh fruits and vegetables a day—goals only 3% of Americans reach, he adds.

The test, so far generally not covered by insurance, typically costs $100 to $200 or more in the doctor's office and $150 for the home version, available directly through OmegaQuant or through Gene Smart Wellness LLC, of Winston-Salem, N.C. The home test, while convenient, has a slight margin of error; if your home-test result comes back as 5%, Dr. Harris says, the lab is 95% confident that the result lies between 4% and 6%.