Project description
Disruptive technology helping prevent neonatal deaths
The alarming daily number of neonatal deaths has put foetal monitoring under the spotlight. A baby’s heartbeat can be checked continuously with cardiotocographs (CTGs); however, this requires medical staff to constantly interpret the data. This type of monitoring can also make it hard for mothers to move freely during birth, and it can be unreliable at times. The EU-funded ARFM project aims to change this with their mobile foetal heart rate (FHR) automatic recording solution. The device works by placing a multi-sensor belt on the maternal abdomen. Then, using AI algorithms, it searches and tracks FHR instantly while avoiding any breaks in FHR automatic recording. The solution can be used both at home and at maternity wards.
Objective
With 2.7 million new-born infants and 0.3 million pregnant women who died in 2015 , making pregnancy safer is a public health priority worldwide, and in Europe in particular. It is estimated that 70% of neonatal deaths may be avoided . Even though, foetal monitoring with cardiotocographs (CTG) is the medical reference since 1968, it remains unsatisfactory with problems related to CTGs observed in 25% of foetal deaths. Moreover, antenatal hospitalisation for expecting mother considered to be “at-risk” is costly, and will grow with the increased number of at-risk pregnancies.
There is an urgent medical need to improve foetal monitoring while addressing healthcare cost issue, but cardiotocographs has showed no major innovation since its creation in the 60’s. CTGs are still difficult to place for some patients, not always reliable (especially in case of foetal moves), and require medical staff nearby for data acquisition. To answer to this unsatisfactory observation, a complementary team constituted of obstetricians, medical imaging engineers and an expert in innovation decided to create Nateo Healthcare and develop a disruptive CTG. Nateo Healthcare’s CTG will be the first CTG allowing patient self-monitoring at home with a high standard of care, thanks to an automated detection of foetal heart rate (FHR), a discrimination of FHR from maternal environment, a mobile and connected device, associated to a telemedicine platform. Fœtal well-being monitoring will be improved, enhancing neonatal outcomes (deaths, sequelae). At-home monitoring will also generate a 50% decrease of healthcare cost related to at-risk pregnancies. With a prototype ongoing, Nateo Healthcare now accelerates its development to reach the market quickly, in a market monopolised by multinational companies, and achieve a leader position in remote monitoring for pregnancy. Nateo Heathcare’s total turnover is expected to exceed 100 M € by 2030 and to create several hundred of direct and indirect jobs.
Fields of science
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1Coordinator
31100 TOULOUSE
France
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.