Healium Enters into Know-How License with Mayo Clinic; Closes $3.6M in Seed Investments
Healium's collaboration with Mayo Clinic and several venture capital investors will allow it to further develop its novel technology.
Columbia, Missouri, April 04, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Healium, a virtual and augmented reality biofeedback company, announces that it has entered into a know-how agreement with Mayo Clinic. Healium’s products and patented technologies bring biometric data from fitness trackers to life inside virtual, augmented, or mixed reality stories so the user can see and interact with their own EEG brain patterns, heart rate, skin conductance, blood pressure or other biomarkers.
Through this know-how agreement, Mayo Clinic will provide subject matter experts to assist in the development of immersive mental health and fitness capabilities utilizing virtual and augmented reality.
“By collaborating with Mayo Clinic, we’ve built an important bridge between biometric data, generative AI, and XR content,” said Sarah Hill, Healium’s CEO who developed the technology with Dr. Jeff Tarrant in 2016 to counteract the traumatic media images she encountered as a former TV broadcaster.
“Media images can be hurtful but when compounded differently into something soothing, they can also heal,” said Hill. “These are powerful, drugless, portable coping mechanisms for this mental health emergency that quickly interrupt the stress response.”
Healium’s immersive products, including Sleepium, are used worldwide in schools, with frontline healthcare workers, elite athletes, and the US military to self-manage anxiety, burnout, and downshift the nervous system before sleep or stressful events. In 7 peer-reviewed journals, Healium has been shown to have clinical benefit in as little as 4 minutes.
Healium works by spatializing bio-data from consumer wearables that are commonly available in users'
homes into a 3D solar system, butterflies, or even a jaguar that will stop pacing if they quiet their minds. VR goggles are optional, and Healium has a mobile augmented reality version that works just with a phone or tablet. Healium’s iOS and Android mobile apps are currently compatible with Apple Watch and some most consumer-grade EEG headbands, with more fitness trackers to be added.
According to Healium, 700,000 people worldwide take their own lives each year. Emotional stress is the cause of 90% of doctor’s visits, and up to 50% of the population struggles with insomnia. With the rise of the opioid epidemic, not everyone wants to take anxiety or sleep pharmaceuticals due to concerns about side effects and addiction.
Stress is the 21st century epidemic according to the World Health Organization. Stress and insomnia cost US businesses more than $300B each year due to absenteeism, reduced productivity, poor decision-making, and mistakes. While meditation helps, it can be difficult to know whether it’s working. Users may find it difficult to quiet their minds if they can't see or interact with it. Healium allows users to not just track the EEG brainwave and heart rate data from their wearables, as well as see and interact with their feelings as 3D objects, helping them learn to self-regulate their calm, focus, and pre-sleep routine. Most VR goggles now come with blue light filters or “night mode” settings to help users fall asleep.
Healium recently completed a successful seed raise, totaling more than $3.6M in oversubscribed rounds with numerous venture capital funds participating. Mayo Clinic has a financial interest in the technology referenced in this announcement, and Mayo Clinic will use any revenue it receives to support its not-for-profit mission in patient care, education, and research.
Lais Botella de Campos
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