Issue link: https://tmcpulse.uberflip.com/i/1125769
t m c » p u l s e | j u n e 2 0 1 9 t m c » p u l s e | j u n e 2 0 1 9 24 By the time symptoms of the bleeding appear, the patient often requires a blood transfusion and will likely have a longer stay in the hospital. At that point, the risk of mortality has already increased. "A single unit of blood actu- ally changes the course of when a patient is going to get out of the hospital, and it can generate a whole host of other problems," said Kenneth Bueche, chief operations officer of Saranas. "That's the problem we're trying to address," Syed added. "Our thesis is that by being able to monitor the bleed status of the patient, both during and after the procedure, and being able to inform the clinician early of a potential bleed compli- cation, they're going to be able to mitigate some of those downstream consequences of the bleed, both from a clinical perspective as well as a health economic perspective." Since the company's founding in 2013, the technology has been patented, the company has par- ticipated in the TMCx accelerator program, joined TMCx+ and raised capital. The device has run through clinical pilots across multiple cen- ters throughout the United States, including two in the Texas Medical Center. And in March 2018, the Early Bird Bleed Monitoring System was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The next step is putting the tech- nology into the hands of clinicians. "As a company, immediately what we want to do is demonstrate the clinical utility of this novel tech- nology. We're excited to have the FDA approval and a new product code that allows us to now market this into health systems where we have heard from doctors wanting to try it out," Syed said. "Our mission is to make these procedures safer, and we think our technology could improve not only the quality of those procedures but hopefully the quality of life of the patients who are undergoing those procedures." Razavi is proud of the collabo- rative process that led to the birth of the Early Bird Bleed Monitoring System. "I think we could almost be a poster child for what the TMC is supposed to be like," he said. "Where one person gets an idea and nurtures it through its earli- est stages as a seed, and then the plant starts growing with Rice, and then as it matures you turn around and you are at TMCx, then you do preclinical studies at THI, then you have hospitals such as both Methodist and THI participating in the clinical studies. It doesn't get better than this in terms of process." Leading the Saranas team are Kenneth Bueche, chief operations officer, and Zaffer Syed, president and chief executive officer.