AxoGen, Inc. Avance® Nerve Graft Recipient to be honored on Donate Life Rose Parade Float on New Year's Day

Recipient of AxoGen nerve grafts will represent all nerve tissue recipients and ride on the Donate Life Rose Parade Float to promote awareness of importance of nerve tissue donation

Alachua, FL (PRWEB) December 23, 2014

AxoGen, Inc. (NASDAQ: AXGN), a high-growth medical technology company with a unique and innovative portfolio of products used to repair injured peripheral nerves, announced that Shirley Pincus, one of the thousands of patients who have had injured nerves repaired with AxoGen's Avance® Nerve Graft, will be honored as a recipient of donated nerve tissue as a float rider in the 2015 Rose Parade aboard the Donate Life Rose Parade Float in Pasadena, California on New Year's Day.

Shirley, a native of Illinois, is one of 30 riders on the float, all of whom have received the gift of donated tissue, organs or eyes thanks to the generosity of deceased donors and their families.

A polio survivor, Shirley underwent multiple surgeries as a child to correct issues caused by the disease. During the procedures, peripheral nerves in her leg were injured. The nerve damage in her leg caused pain which grew more intense, and eventually debilitating, as she aged. Shirley sought medical help for the pain for many years, including an attempt to relieve her pain by partially amputating two of her toes. She finally found Drs. Edgardo Rodriguez and Roberto Segura of Chicago Foot and Ankle in Chicago, IL in late 2013. The doctors performed diagnostic nerve tests which identified several areas of damaged nerve tissue. They then performed a surgical procedure to remove the damaged nerve tissue from three places in Shirley’s leg and repair it with Avance® Nerve Graft, processed donated human nerve tissue. Thanks to her perseverance, a proper diagnosis, expert surgeons, physical therapy and the generous donation of nerve tissue, Shirley is returning to everyday activity and is regaining her quality of life.

"I am delighted, humbled and honored to represent nerve tissue recipients on the Donate Life Rose Parade Float," said Shirley. "Learning that damaged nerves were causing my pain and that they could be repaired with donated human nerve tissue was amazing. The most important message I can share with others suffering from nerve damage is to find a doctor who can properly diagnose nerve function and recommend viable options for treatment. Thanks to Drs. Rodriguez and Segura and to Avance® Nerve Graft, my nerve injuries have been repaired and I can focus on becoming active again.”

Jill Schiaparelli, Senior Vice President at AxoGen, remarked, “AxoGen is honored to have offered a nerve repair solution that helped to repair Shirley’s nerve injuries and improve her quality of life. Shirley is one of more than 900,000 patients in the US this year that will have surgery to repair injured or damaged peripheral nerves. Her story is one to which many patients suffering from nerve injuries can relate and is a wonderful example of successful nerve repair with Avance® Nerve Graft.”

About the Donate Life Rose Parade Float

The 2015 Donate Life Rose Parade Float is coordinated by Los Angeles-based OneLegacy, the world's largest organ, eye and tissue recovery organization. Since its debut on New Year's Day 2004, the Donate Life Rose Parade Float has become a key component in the organization's mission to inspire people to become organ, eye, and tissue donors to help save and heal lives. For more information visit, http://www.DonateLifeFloat.org.

The Donate Life Rose Parade Float's family of sponsors urges viewers to help make dreams come true for more than one million people in need of life-saving and healing tissue, organ, and eye transplants. Join America's 113 million registered donors so that everyone whose life and livelihood depends on a transplant can have one. Sign up when renewing your driver's license or by visiting http://www.DonateLifeAmerica.org.

About the Rose Parade

The 126th Rose Parade presented by Honda, themed "Inspiring Stories," will take place Thursday, January 1, 2015, at 8 am PST. The Pasadena Tournament of Roses is a volunteer organization that annually hosts the Rose Parade®, the Rose Bowl Game® and a variety of associated events. For additional information, please visit http://www.TournamentOfRoses.com.

About AxoGen, Inc.

AxoGen (NASDAQ: AXGN) is a leading medical technology company dedicated to peripheral nerve repair. AxoGen’s portfolio of regenerative medicine products is available in the United States, Canada and several European countries and includes Avance® Nerve Graft, the only off-the-shelf commercially available processed nerve allograft for bridging severed nerves without the comorbidities associated with a second surgical site, AxoGuard® Nerve Connector, a porcine submucosa extracellular matrix (“ECM”) coaptation aid for tensionless repair of severed nerves, and AxoGuard® Nerve Protector, a porcine submucosa ECM product used to wrap and protect injured peripheral nerves and reinforce the nerve reconstruction while preventing soft tissue attachments.

Avance® Nerve Graft is processed in the United States by AxoGen. AxoGuard® Nerve Connector and AxoGuard® Nerve Protector are manufactured in the United States by Cook Biotech Incorporated, and are distributed exclusively by AxoGen. AxoGen maintains its corporate offices in Alachua, Florida and is the parent of its wholly owned operating subsidiary, AxoGen Corporation.

Cautionary Statement Concerning Forward-Looking Statements

This Press Release contains "forward-looking" statements as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements are based on management's current expectations or predictions of future conditions, events or results based on various assumptions and management's estimates of trends and economic factors in the markets in which we are active, as well as our business plans. Words such as "expects", "anticipates", "intends", "plans", "believes", "seeks", "estimates", "projects", "forecasts", "continue", "may", "should", "will" variations of such words and similar expressions are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements may include, without limitation, statements regarding our growth, our product development and product potential. The forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, which may cause results to differ materially from those set forth in the statements. Forward-looking statements in this release should be evaluated together with the many uncertainties that affect AxoGen's business and its market, particularly those discussed in the risk factors and cautionary statements in AxoGen's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance, and actual results may differ materially from those projected. The forward-looking statements are representative only as of the date they are made, and, except as required by law, AxoGen assumes no responsibility to update any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

Released December 23, 2014