Empatica, a digital health and AI company developing medical-grade wearables and digital biomarkers for health monitoring and diagnostics, announced plans to launch a first-of-its-kind study aimed at developing of a seizure prediction algorithm for people with epilepsy, based on real-world data collected using the company’s technology.
According to figures from the Centers for Disease Control, more than 3 million Americans suffer from epilepsy. And about a third of people with epilepsy have refractory epilepsy, which occurs when medications no longer control seizures 1 . Seizures are disruptive health events that can have a significant negative impact on quality of life and increase the risk of injury and death for people with epilepsy. This study is designed to identify individualized periods of seizure risk for patients with epilepsy, using biomarker viability and patterns in patients’ lifestyle data as input to a prediction algorithm.
“ Seizure prediction has long been one of the most requested features for people with epilepsy. We are excited to announce our plans to initiate a large clinical trial focused on using wearable technology to enable the reliable prediction of seizures,” said Dr. Rosalind Picard, co-founder and chief scientist at Empatica. “ Patients with epilepsy understand the toll uncertainty around seizures takes and we hope this study will help them gain better control over their lives, reduce stress and perhaps enable early interventions that ultimately reduce or prevent seizures.”
This study builds on Empatica’s proven experience in monitoring neurological conditions such as epilepsy. Empatica’s Embrace smartwatch is the first and only FDA-approved wearable technology for detecting potential convulsive seizures, and one of the first AI-based medical products to be approved by the FDA. Empatica’s wearables have also previously been used to successfully collect data shown to predict seizures in a peer-reviewed study from the Mayo Clinic, King’s College and University of Melbourne, funded by the Epilepsy Foundation through the Seizure Gauge initiative 2 . Through the upcoming research, Empatica plans to leverage its expertise in AI and machine learning, as well as its access to the largest real-world dataset of convulsive seizures, to develop the seizure prediction algorithm.
This study further advances Empatica’s work in developing AI-powered predictive algorithms. In 2021, Empatica developed an AI-based predictive algorithm that was CE marked for medical use in the EU, aimed at providing an alert when early signs of respiratory infections, including Covid-19 , are detected.
SOURCE: PRNewswire
