ROBIN MEDICAL INC — Department of Health and Human Services SBIR Phase II: 101

Description

Summary The long term objective of the project is to implement new motion robust magnetic resonance imagingMRItechnology into wide clinical and research useMagnetic resonance imaging is a powerful tool that aids in the diagnosis of individual subjectsguides their clinical careand provides insights into the mechanisms of normal and atypical developmentThe characterization of mental health disorders across the lifespan has been facilitated by brain MRIHoweverconventional magnetic resonance imaging requires the subject being imaged remain perfectly still for the duration of the image encodingYoung children and non cooperative adult patients have difficulty to hold still long enough for successful imagingFor clinical imaging such patients are frequently sedated or anesthetizedwhich runs the risk of adverse eventsis costlyand does not ensure the subjects remain perfectly stillResearch studies are typically unable to use sedation or anesthesia due to its significant riskThis hampers our ability to identify the neurobiological underpinnings of mental health disordersThe ability to use routinely motion robust magnetic resonance imaging will enable dramatic improvements in our capacity to chart the trajectory of mental illness over the lifespanThis will have a significant impact on our ability to determine whenwhere and how to interveneand enable improved evaluation of potential interventionsThe project proposes to utilize a combination of hardware for prospective motion tracking during scan and post acquisition processing to enable the construction of high resolution and high signal to noise ratio images of the brain from subjects who are unable to hold stillThe specific aims of this Phase IIB SBIR application are to optimize the EndoScout configuration and workflow for routine clinical and research useto implement of the hybrid prospective re acquisition retrospective framework into a wide scale clinical and research useand to develop newsophisticate motion correction approachesThis is a joint project by Robin MedicalIncwhich will optimize the motion tracking system for routine clinical and human research usethe Research Section at the Department of RadiologyChildren s Hospital Bostonwhich will implement the prospective motion correction algorithm into wide range of imaging sequences and will conduct the clinical studies of the projectand the Martinos Center at the Massachusetts General Hospital that will develop advanced sequences for prospective motion correctionusing the EndoScout tracking data along with image navigatorsand will use the motion immune MRI sequences in ongoing human research studies Narrative The proposed project aims to enable MRI in children and non cooperative adults without sedation or anesthesiaIf successfulit will reduce healthcare costs as sedation or anesthesia for MRI doubles or triples the cost of the scanit will expand the use of MRI in children and non cooperative adults to smaller hospitals that do not have the required resources to conduct MRI under sedation or anesthesiaand it will eliminate the risks associated with sedation or anesthesia and thus will enable to expand the use of MRI to clinical and research application where it is now not being used due to associated risks