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Neurotech Vendors Make Presentations at Investing & Partnering Conference May 2012 Several executives of neurotechnology firms made presentations at the 2012 Neurotech Industry Investing & Partnering Conference, held in Boston, MA earlier this month. The event was hosted and NeuroInsights. The conference began with a session on investment chaired Health Ventures. Leuchter mentioned that neuro telemedicine is an area that hasn’t yet been embraced .

Government Certainty While not everyone is pleased with government and its role in healthcare, it’s safe to say that there is a little more certainty in Washington now that the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld President Obama’s Affordable Care Act. Healthcare providers and payors—and the medical device companies who do business with them—at least now have a firmer grasp on what lies in store for them in the years ahead as the new law gets implemented.

Fighting Paralysis For individuals with paralysis caused , there has not been a lot of new product activity in the area of neuroprosthetics in recent years. Although new functional electrical stimulation systems for assisted breathing and for foot-drop have been approved, these indications serve a minority of the SCI community. In part because of the overall tardiness of getting FDA approval for ne…

Let’s Use Our Head with Brain Safety This has been a challenging month for the medical device industry, and St. Jude Medical, in particular. The company temporarily pulled its Brio DBS system off the market in Europe, reportedly citing header problems in a letter to clinicians. And St. Jude was thrashed in a New York Times article about medical device safety. Although the article didn’t mention neu…

Diabetes Market Presents New Neurotech Opportunity January 2012 The market for diagnosing and treating diabetes offers a new opportunity for neurotechnology device manufacturers. The increase in incidence of Type II diabetes in recent years is one demographic factor pointing to this opportunity. The prevalence of diabetes is more than 20 million in the U.S. with another 80 million in pre-diabetic individuals.

New Depression Research May Yield Novel Therapies February 2012 New research into the brain mechanisms leading to clinical depression may pave the way for new therapeutic approaches to treating the disorder. In particular, increased understanding of the brain networks and pathologies in neural communication that accompany depression offer hope for pinpointing new neuromodulation strategies. Clinica…

New Tools, New Knowledge One of the keys to the development of the neurotechnology industry is advances in basic neuroscience, including enhanced understanding of the structure and function of the human brain. As we have witnessed many times over the years, advances in basic science have led directly to improvements in neurotech tools and therapies such as deep brain stimulation or EEG sensing. The…

New Blood for Neurotech For the last eight years, the neurotechnology industry has been dominated , publicly held medical firms: Medtronic, St. Jude Medical, and Boston Scientific. Much as they did in the cardiac device market in the previous decade, these three behemoths have divvied up the neurotech device space, maintaining their share of clinicians and patients with spinal cord stimulation systems.

Informed Content As the range and complexity of neurotechnology products expands, it is becoming more important for vendors of neurotech devices to educate their customers about the capabilities of their systems. Most vendors have produced product literature and documentation that provide clinicians with the technical information they need. But this information is often too technical for potential patients and end-users.

2011 In Review As 2011 comes to a close, it’s worth taking a look back at significant events in the neurotechnology industry during the year. This year marked the beginning of our second decade publishing Neurotech Business Report and as was true 10 years ago, the pace of new product development and promising research continues to be impressive. One of the more interesting themes during the year was the growth of the consumer neurotech space.