LAS VEGAS– BrainCheck Inc., developer of the innovative digital cognitive assessment and care management platform, today announced a $1.5M grant award from the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program. Known as “America’s Seed Fund,” SBIR is a U.S. government funding program for small businesses designed to advance commercialization of innovative solutions. The grant will be used to fund a new study to deploy BrainCheck® CARE™ in diverse patient populations and measure its ability to improve health outcomes and quality metrics for health systems and payors.
Sixty percent of people living with dementia are undiagnosed, due in large part to insufficient access to cognitive assessment. Only half of older adults have received even the most basic testing, and only 16% receive regular monitoring assessments. These numbers are remarkably low, despite growing research highlighting the importance of early intervention to slow disease progression, improve patients’ quality of life, and prolong functional independence. Studies suggest that up to forty percent of dementia can be prevented or slowed with early intervention. However, for these interventions to work, physicians must create a holistic plan, educate patients and their care partners, and monitor the results.
Effective cognitive care planning as currently practiced by pencil-and-paper is time consuming, logistically challenging, and impractical for most providers. As a result, cognitive care planning is rare. BrainCheck CARE provides clinicians with an easy-to-use, digital workflow that guides patients, care partners and other providers through the collaborative process of creating and implementing a cognitive care plan. By mapping care plan recommendations to cognitive assessments, BrainCheck CARE is personalized, focusing on the areas of deficit specific to each patient. Built-in patient education and repeat assessment and monitoring mean that the care plans are continually enhanced and optimized. Cognitive care planning, and the resulting improvement in dementia care management, can meaningfully alleviate disease burden for patients and caregivers. BrainCheck CARE is substantially enhancing the efficiency, implementation, and impact of cognitive care planning, thus transforming routine dementia care.
“The grant from SBIR is recognition of BrainCheck’s innovative approach to the massive unmet need for cognitive healthcare,” said Yael Katz, PhD, co-founder and CEO of BrainCheck. “BrainCheck CARE has the potential to transform the dementia assessment, diagnosis, and care management process for physicians, patients, and caregivers. This SBIR grant will enable us to formally evaluate the impact of our platform in the real world and use the results to guide improvements and new features.”
BrainCheck’s new study is the next step in a series of research projects to identify and remove barriers to cognitive care and align their solution with provider needs and priorities. This study will quantify the extent to which BrainCheck CARE improves operational efficiency, usability, and provider engagement with cognitive care planning compared to a manual, ad-hoc approach. The study will also compare the short- and longer-term impacts of BrainCheck CARE on the health and well-being of patients and their caregivers.
“This new study is an important next step for our team to continue examining the BrainCheck CARE platform and its ability to impact patient outcomes,” said Dr. Reza Ghomi, Neurologist, Psychiatrist and Chief Medical Officer at BrainCheck. “Post-diagnosis care planning is critical to increasing time at home, preventing hospitalization, and respecting patient’s wishes. Physicians must be empowered with the resources to provide this.”
BrainCheck is being used in more than 500 clinical practices and enterprise health systems, including UPMC, Advocate Aurora, and Mercy, with over 150,000 BrainCheck assessments administered.
