Pantec first to inject drugs with light

This is not just an issue for kids. It's also an issue for Type I diabetics, who need insulin injections, for cancer patients using injectable drugs, and for women trying to conceive with In Vitro Fertilization injections.

The solution is light. Specifically, tiny pinpricks delivered by a laser through the skin, followed quickly by the drug's delivery. (Picture from Pantec Biosciences.)

The Painless Laser Epidermal System (they call it PLEASE) comes from Pantec Biosciences, a Swiss company (with a main office in Liechtenstein) whose engineering expertise has produced products for printing, textiles and industrial measurement.

PLEASE began with an Austrian IVF specialist, Herbert Zech, back in 2004 and the 3 micron laser system dates from 2007, according to the Pantech Web site. It was given its first European CE approval in 2008, and specific approval for the IVF market last year. It has now been given general CE approval.

The big publicity push is based on these hurdles having been crossed, and the device's general functionality as an injection solution.

A home version is being marketed -- pitched for quick, painless prescription with higher compliance under the control of doctors -- along with a professional version -- pitched for faster injections at clinics and hospitals.

Those pitches of efficiency, accuracy, and improved compliance are all important to the product's marketing. Needles are cheap, lasers cost more, and without serious benefits an advance like this could be just a more expensive way of doing the same old thing.