It may sound like what every teen-ager's parent needs – a mobile device that can actually "see" inside a person's head – but an Israeli firm is developing the technology to help people with traumatic head injuries.
HeadSense Medical announced this week that it has closed financing from a variety of investors spread over three continents for its non-invasive intracranial pressure (ICP) monitor, which uses disposable earbud sensors to generate an acoustic signal that maps out the inside of the head. The data generated from the signal can be analyzed immediately on a tablet or smartphone and used in the treatment of head trauma, strokes, brain tumors and other conditions.
"Intracranial pressure is an important parameter for the diagnosis and monitoring of patients suffering from head trauma, strokes and other conditions," said Guy Weinberg, CEO of the Netanya, Israel-based company, which launched in April of 2011, in a press release. "The current gold standard is expensive, invasive and requires a skilled neurosurgeon. With this new distributive technology we are offering a non-invasive, accurate, continuous and cost-effective alternative that will improve patient care by allowing more patients to be monitored with reduced costs."
According to company officials, more than 3 million persons in the United States alone suffer from stroke, traumatic brain injury and brain tumors, but due to the invasive nature and cost of the current technology, only 200,000 invasive ICP monitoring procedures have been conducted. The current process includes drilling a burr hole in the skull and inserting a pressure sensor on the cranium.
With the HeadSense ICP monitor, the earbuds are placed in a patient's ears and a speaker in one earbud generates an acoustic sound in a fixed frequency for 5-10 seconds. That signal is picked up by the receiving sensor in the other earbud and is converted into a digital signal.
The technology has been used in trials in India and Armenia, with a third trial now underway in Verona, Italy, and involving as many as 30 patients.
The round of financing was led by Pontifax, a leading Israeli venture capital firm, and included GE Ventures of Menlo Park, Calif., Everett Partners of Akron, Ohio, and JuMaJo, based in Hamburg, Germany.
"Disruptive digital and mobile health innovation, like HeadSense, is crucial to improving the quality and affordability of healthcare," said Noah Lewis, managing director for GE Ventures, in the release. "We are excited to help HeadSense as it brings its technology to market."
