After a series of research projects that began in 2008, a medical startup born at Union College is in some of the final steps before commercialization.
The startup iPACES — Interactive Physical and Cognitive Exercise System — is conducting clinical trials to test the efficacy of an “exergame” device meant to slow cognitive decline in early dementia patients, according to Cay Anderson-Hanley, Union College professor and founder of the startup.
The product is an under-table stationary bike peddler enhanced with tablet-based virtual reality visualizations. The premise of the game is that the players are running errands in their neighborhood. Players have to remember their errand list and then choose pathways that keep them on schedule.
The ultimate goal is to sell the product as a prescribable intervention for early dementia patients, Anderson-Hanley said.
"We're not saying we're curing Alzheimer's or anything like that, but it's one other tool that people can use to try to help their cognitive function."
After some initial research, Anderson-Hanley published a paper in 2012 that showed dementia patients who played an exergame while pedaling had better cognitive outcomes than those who only pedaled.
"What we're looking for is sustained kinds of change,” Anderson-Hanley said. “Part of what's tricky in the mild cognitive impairment crowd is that we're not always looking for improvement. It's not always that we're going to climb. They might already be on a declining trajectory, and what we're trying to do is slow down the decline and get it to even level off."
After several federal grants from the National Institute on Aging to further that research, the agency encouraged her to move toward commercialization about three years ago, Anderson-Hanley said.
The startup recently got a $1.4 million direct-to-phase 2 SBIR grant that's enabling the group to carry out the trials. Led by Pacific Brain Health Center and Albany Medical College, the trial is currently recruiting for 120 participants with early cognitive impairment.
The game was developed by Troy studio 1st Playable Productions. There are a couple of other people working on programming as employees of iPACES.
She said the group has done several pilot trials, but it's going to take a lot more data to make the final determination of efficacy. She thinks there will be some more substantive evidence in the next six months or so.
"Looking over three months, we've been able to detect some changes on a group level, so it doesn't always mean that each individual is going to have noticeable or clinically significant change," Anderson-Hanley said.
If the trials are successful, it'll mean applying for FDA approval and heading straight to commercialization.
She's already submitted a number of grant proposals for funding to move to the next step. The startup is also working on some pilot trials to look into the device's effect on patients with other neuro conditions, including Parkinson’s and autism.
