In its latest round of seed grants, Philadelphia Pediatric Medical Device Consortium (PPDC) has awarded $50,000 each to companies developing a speech generating system and a portable head injury screening device, respectively.

The noddle, from Coralville, Iowa-based Voxello LLC, is designed to detect the smallest intentional gestures in children who cannot speak—such as a tongue click, head nod, or other small gesture—and allow them to access the nurse call system and control a speech generating device

The seed money will enable the company to further develop the device and conduct clinical trials of the device among hospitalized children and children with developmental disabilities.

CHOP noddle

The second medical device is the Infrascanner, developed by Philadelphia-based InfraScan Inc. It features near-infrared technology designed to screen patients for intracranial hematomas and identify those who would most benefit from immediate referral to a CT scan and neurosurgical intervention.

The seed money will fund a clinical study for the pediatric FDA clearance of the Infrascanner Model 2000, according to a media release from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.

CHOP Infrascanner

Based at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP), PPDC is a collaboration among CHOP, Drexel University, and the University of Pennsylvania. PPDC provides the know-how, and the FDA provides the seed funding, to help inventors translate ideas into commercial medical devices for use in children.

This most recent round of seed funding awards is the fourth by the PPDC, following others announced in February 2015, January 2016, and January 2017.

The two recipients were chosen from a field of eight competition finalists.

For the second year in a row, the release continues, the PPDC partnered with the Childress Institute for Pediatric Trauma to fund a device that can be used during the so-called “golden hour of care” following a traumatic injury.

“We are very excited to once again provide these awards to innovators of medical devices for kids, and grateful to our partners at the Childress Institute for their matching funds,” says engineer Matthew R. Maltese, PhD, of Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, the Consortium’s executive director and principal investigator, in the release.

[Source(s): Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, PR Newswire]