Catheter Research, Inc. - About Catheter Research

Catheter Research, Inc. (CRI) was founded on the futuristic technology of steering using nitinol. The company was incorporated in Indiana in 1987 after operating out of the creator's converted basement for five years. Previously a subsidiary of Biomet, Inc., CRI is located in Indianapolis.

Specializing in catheters and tubing products, CRI has expanded as a developer and manufacturer of medical devices. The products are sold almost exclusively on an OEM basis. With complete solutions for design, development, and manufacturing problems with medical devices, CRI can provide you with a single delivery of three prototype catheters for a feasibility study, or a monthly supply of 250,000 complete, packaged, sterile products. Our goal is to provide the most cost-effective product development combined with quality OEM medical device manufacturing.

Technology
Since the early days of CRI the futuristic technology of steering using nitinol has been proven to be effective in certain applications, such as small and/or long, flexible products. Imbedding an element of shape memory nitinol in the tip of a catheter provides active, on-demand steering. Mechanical, pull-wire, technology competes with nitinol steering. Mechanical steering requires that the tension of the pull wires be transmitted to the tip of a catheter. For that reason the catheter shaft must have enough column strength to support that pull force. With short, stiff catheters, mechanical steering is effective. In long, small OD, and flexible catheters, nitinol steering may be the only effective method.

CRI has numerous patents describing various catheters and similar medical devices with single and multiple elements of shape memory nitinol. These elements of nitinol are employed to change the shape and/or stiffen a catheter. We expect this technology to become more and more valuable as medicine moves toward less invasive surgery and smaller catheters and tools are required.