Company Profile:
Cerora
Cerora is a healthcare IT company creating a portable, real-time and easy to use neuro-diagnostic technology to assess brain health generally and concussion specifically. To date, there is no objective, accurate and portable diagnostic tool to assess brain function and facilitate decision-making in the diagnosis and treatment of neurologic and neuropsychiatric conditions. Cerora is filling this gap by combining biosensor advances with an innovative “neuro-diagnostics as a service” IT infrastructure and multi-modal Borealis™ assessment platform solution to empower decisions in conditions ranging from mild Traumatic Brain Injury, to development disorders such as Autism, to brain tumors, and neurodegenerative conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease.
Q: Please tell us how your business idea was conceived. Was there an "aha" moment or did it evolve gradually?
A: The multimodal approach to brain health assessment evolved from an initial effort to build a business around a single dry lead EEG headset. Based on the feedback to a poster session at the July 2011 Alzheimer’s Association International Conference from several neurologists who did not think one could get clinical specificity with just a single lead EEG, the company pivoted. We looked for alternative modalities of information to add on to the single lead EEG to increase specificity. Cerora was born that December to create a brain health assessment platform with a single lead EEG that includes not only symptoms and neuropsychological data, but also voice analyses from microphone recordings as well as input from other biosensors like accelerometers and eye trackers.
Q: What single word or phrase best describes the culture of your startup and why?
A: Sensors that make sense of the brain. The brain is a complex organ that sits within a privileged compartment of the body; little is truly understood about it. Rather than take snapshots and photos, Cerora’s technology is designed to take movies and capture the rich dynamics of the brain leading to an accurate understanding of the underlying circuits. The company brings a scientifically rigorous and medical approach with the ultimate aim of making brain health assessment technology easy to use and accessible, not just in the wealthy nations, but for people around the world. At Cerora, we are all about "empowered decisions…peace of mind."
Q: What's the most inventive, innovative, or disruptive aspect of your initiative?
A: The creation of an easy-to-use, portable, and accurate multimodal biosensor system on an activated, physiologically focused data acquisition platform. Much like a treadmill test for the heart puts the organ of interest under a load to increase clinical sensitivity and clinical specificity, the Cerora Borealis platform physiologically probes various circuits of the brain for defects and lesions while an individual is under a cognitive or sensory load. In particular, Cerora Borealis technology looks at the visual cortex, auditory cortex, prefrontal / executive function, as well as somatosensory and olfactory circuits of the brain.
Q: How will it help people live to their greatest potential or contribute to making the world healthier?
A: Brain diseases and disorders, including Alzheimer’s, concussion, migraine, and autism, affect millions of people on Earth each year. Cerora’s technology solution should enable early detection of each of conditions, thereby enhancing the probability of improved clinical outcomes. In time, such diagnostic advances should empower therapeutic advances, which could ultimately rid human populations of not only developmental and neurodegenerative brain diseases, but also trauma and tumor-based brain injuries.
Q: Five years from now, what would you like to be able to say has been your most important contribution to health?
A: Our five-year goal is to have a major positive impact on brain health assessment globally, with a particular focus on mild traumatic brain injury or concussion. Cerora would like to see that our medical devices and diagnostic technology have been approved by regulatory authorities around the world, empowering clinical decisions with objective, biosensor-based neurodiagnostic information, leading to peace of mind for patients, parents, physicians, and payors. We want to be part of the solution to bend the cost curve significantly down. The technology should be portable, accurate, and accessible so that it provides neurodiagnostic information to billions of people, ridding the world of trauma-induced and age-related brain diseases.