Rhythmlink International LLC has entered into a patent licensing agreement with Dignity Health that includes broad coverage for improving and expanding brain health monitoring options for caregivers and patients. Dignity Health’s US Patent Number 9,345,418 was protected and commercialized by the Dignity Health Intellectual Property Office and covers an EEG Net with Transmission Capabilities. This proprietary technology allows quick collection of EEG data and distribution to medical equipment and health care personnel for analysis and intervention.

This technology expands the ability of both hospitals to perform brain health monitoring to identify dangerous patient conditions including subclinical seizure and stroke. It extends the ability to perform brain health monitoring outside of the hospital to ambulances, urgent care clinics, and the home.

“Rhythmlink invests heavily annually in research and development and for more than 15 years has been developing innovative technologies that are helping connect patients to machines to record physiologic information from the brain and nervous system. We are excited to expand our product offering into the brain health monitoring space,” says Shawn Regan, co-founder and CEO of Rhythmlink, in a release. This licensed patent is part of Rhythmlink’s patent portfolio, which includes 22 issued, pending or licensed patents. Rhythmlink plans to release products to the market covered by this patent in the fourth quarter of 2017. “By adding this patent to our portfolio Rhythmlink continues its quest to make brain health monitoring as ubiquitous as EKG electrodes and equipment have made heart health monitoring over the past 50 years.”

Brian Alkire, intraoperative neurophysiologic monitoring technician at St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix and the architect of the initial concept for the patent, says, “This partnership is exciting because Rhythmlink has the capability to turn this intellectual property into a device that will dramatically improve the quality of care for patients with acute neurological deficits.” Alkire presented his idea to Dignity Health’s Intellectual Property Office, who partnered with Rhythmlink to develop it.

“The problem I set out solve was that some patients with an acute onset of a neurological deficit that is time sensitive, such as stroke patients, did not have immediate access to electroneurodiagnostic testing,”Alkire says. “This is a serious problem since delayed treatment for these patients can mean long-term neurological deficits. This technology allows the brain’s electrophysiology to be tested by onsite staff without the delay of waiting for the on-call technologist to drive in from home.”