NIH https://www.nih.gov recently announced the winners of their “NIH Technology Accelerator Challenge (NTAC) for Maternal Health”, a competition for developers of diagnostic technologies to help improve maternal health worldwide.
Pregnancy and childbirth complications are a major global health problem. Tragically, these complications result in the deaths of more than 800 women and 7,000 newborns each day.
Low-cost diagnostics that operate at the point-of-care that can detect and differentiate among common conditions associated with pregnancy are needed to help reduce the high rates of maternal morbidity and mortality in low-resource settings.
The winning technologies share a total of $1 million in prizes for the successful design and development of diagnostic tests and platform technologies to reduce maternal morbidity and mortality.
The prize competition managed by the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging & Bioengineering (NIBIB) https://www.nibib.nih.gov, in partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, with support from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the NIH Office of Research on Women’s Health.
First place/$500,00 prize was awarded to Dr. Bethany Hedt-Gauthier, Harvard University for developing tools for community health worker-led home based diagnosis of surgical site infections and anemia post cesarian delivery. The tool enables home-based diagnosis of surgical site infections and anemia.
Second place /$300,000 prize awarded to the University of California, Irvine for developing the maternal obstetrics monitoring sock (MOMS). The hemodynamic monitoring sock is a low cost, portable point of care system to monitor pregnant women for preeclampsia, anemia, and hemorrhage. The tool continuously tracks blood pressure and heart rate and monitors blood flow. It can be used during and after delivery in low resource settings.
Third place/ tie and a $75,000 prize awarded to Softsonics, LLC, San Diego for developing a wearable ultrasound/electrochemical sensor for maternal health surveillance which is a stretchable and integrated wearable sensor providing comprehensive monitoring of pregnancy complications.
Third place/ tie and a $75,000 prize awarded to Raydiant Oximetry, Inc., San Francisco for developing LUMERAH™ near infrared spectroscopy platform to diagnose maternal hemorrhage and fetal distress during pregnancy.
Semi-finalist and a $50,000 prize was awarded to Stanford University for developing Point-of-Care diagnostics tool for preeclampsia and anemia in pregnancy.
Honorable mentions went to:
- VoluMetrix, LLC, Nashville for developing a non-invasive venous waveform analysis for maternal health
- Dr. Mathias Wipf, MOMM Diagnostics, Basel Switzerland for developing Rapid Preeclampsia Diagnostic Test (RaPID)
- Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana for modifying maternal recumbent position to prevent preeclampsia and placental disease
- Washington University in St. Louis for developing Maternal aRMOR for preventing global maternal mortality and morbidity with a wearable device
Go to https://www.nibib.nih.gov/news-events/newsroom/nih-announces-prize-winners-maternal-health-diagnostics-challenge for more information.