BRING THE EMERGENCY ROOM TO YOU!

FIRST Pharmaceuticals has developed a Medical History-Making line of Over-The-Counter Pain Medications. After suffering form a painful head to toe sunburn Ron May was inspired to research a better treatment. What he found was a unique cream and an unexpected World Wide market for it.

Sometimes, it takes great suffering to achieve great success.

Ron May, President of FIRST (Florida Institute for Research, Science & Technology) Pharmaceuticals, knows that first-hand.

May, originally from Ashland, Kentucky, was living in Sarasota, Florida, about five years ago when he got a serious sunburn from head to toe.

It was so bad, May sought medical treatment. A friend working at a local hospital gave him a cream to use. May said he didn't realize the cream should only be used in small areas, and applied it all over his body.

Not only did it not work on the sunburn, but the cream's active ingredient got into May's bloodstream from over-application, causing blood-poisoning. And that's what got May thinking.

"I asked my friend "Why didnt you give me something else to use?" May said. "He told me, "Because that's all there is."

That's when May started doing research for a new type of skin cream for use on sunburns.

And he came up with one. But it turned out to be a lot more.

"I did my research in an effort to develop a sunburn cream worthy of the technology that we have available to us today. That's what I had set out to accomplish," May said.

SURPRISING OUTCOME

May and his associates had been handing out samples of the product on Florida beaches. When people started coming back with the results, he was stunned.

He found that his formulation, ALOCANE, was being reviewed as the best sunburn medication any of the beachgoers had ever tried.

He was stunned. But more shocking was a phone call that he received from one of the people he had given the cream to on the beach.

One person had given the cream to a relative who was undergoing radiation treatment, and it helped on this person's burns (radiation dermatitis)," he said. They had been using any and all available treatments that his radiologist knew of with such unsatisfactory results, that the patient was going to stop taking his radiation treatments and let whatever was going to happen, happen.

Treating radiation burns can be an important part of fighting cancer, May said, because if the pain of the burns is taken away, patients are less likely to become disheartened and discontinue therapy.

The culmination of May's research led to the formation of FIRST Pharmaceuticals and the creation of Alocane Emergency Room Burn Cream, Alocane Hospital Strength Anti-Itch Cream and Alocane Plus Emergency Room First-Aid Cream. All Alocane products are water-based and use 4% Lidocaine (topical anesthetic) the maximum allowed by the Food and Drug Administration - for first and second-degree burns and to relieve itch. Alocane Plus goes one step further by adding Benzalkonium (topical anti-microbial) to help prevent infection.

CURRENTLY IN USE

"Almost every other formidable burn treatment has an oil base or petroleum base," May said. "Oils act as insulators. They trap heat in and increase the skin's temperature and actually slow down the natural healing process."

FIRST Pharmaceuticals has opened distribution centers for his product in Kentucky, where his office is now, and Florida

The creams have been in production in the company's lab in Miami since fall of 2001.

May said he they are currently selling to Retailers, Pharmacies and Hospitals.

A strong testimonial is the U.S. Army. They use ALOCANE for their troops during desert training in California, according to FIRST Pharmaceuticals.

As for its effectiveness for radiation patients, oncologists from various Cancer Centers across the United States are using ALOCANE as their product of choice for their patients.

Connie Clarke from NARTI (Northern Arkansas Radiation Therapy Institute) said " it seems to be the only treatment available that actually gives our patients relief."

"For the over-the-counter market, the new burn treatment will have great success" said Oncologist Jeffrey Lopez.

"We've had it now for about six months," said pharmacy owner, David Stultz of Stultz Pharmacy in Greenup, KY. "They first gave us a few samples, and we gave them to people and they came back thrilled. They've used it on shingles, sunburn, poison ivy, and just about any skin irritation.

"We feel very comfortable recommending it and selling it."

Stultz said that the product has market appeal for several reasons.

Because it's a water base, it doesn't have that oily, greasy feeling on the skin, so "cosmetically, it's a good product as well," he said.

The creams act almost immediately, and sell for less than $10 a tube, whereas other skin treatments go for about $20-$60, Stultz said.

"That's way off the market base," he said. "It certainly looks like this product has great potential."

GOALS IN MIND

May said he would like to see his product in every household, Hospital and Treatment Center across the globe, as well as being sold in pharmacies and retail stores, which is part of the reason for the low price.

It's just a wonder no one's thought of it before.

"Every day during my research, I kept thinking there was something I had missed. I kept thinking today is going to be the day I find another medicine out there and I just overlooked it," he said.

But that day hasn't come.

"I don't think there's any money in it for the big pharmaceutical companies," May said. "Their focus is on life-threatening illnesses."

There's certainly nothing life-threatening about a sunburn, or poison ivy, but as May points out "when you've got it, during that time you feel like you want to die."

After 512 clinical trials with no side effects, and never having run into a doctor or a hospital that's told him "no," May is convinced he's got a product that will change the world.

"I saw a huge void in the category of First-Aid and Anti-Itch Treatments and had the time and resources to do the research," he said. "The truth is, there just wasn't anything else out there that I felt really did the job."