BlueRock Therapeutics collaboration over Parkinson’s disease digital health technology

Clinical stage biopharmaceutical company BlueRock Therapeutics has announced a collaboration with Rune Labs and Emerald Innovations. It will look at using wearable and invisible contactless digital health technology to aid clinical trials researching Parkinson’s disease.

Currently, most data in clinical trials is recorded manually by the patient in ways such as diaries and questionnaires however, due to the nature of Parkinson’s disease, patient error is high when using patient-reporting tools. Physical and neurological assessments performed within a clinical setting also only give a short snapshot of how the patient is performing at that given appointment.

BlueRock is conducting a phase 1 clinical study testing a first-in-class, stem cell-based therapy ‒ bemdaneprocel (BRT-DA01). It is also enrolling 50 patients in a two-year, global, non-intervention study, where technology from Rune Labs and Emerald Innovations will be implemented.

Rune Labs’ StriveSteady works with wearable devices and registers general mobility, tremor intensity and dyskinesia (involuntary movements of the limbs or face) in real-time. They can also monitor patient compliance by seeing when the patient is using their wearable.

Emerald Innovations’ biosensor is classified under ‘invisibles’ which extract health metrics from radio signals without wearable devices. They are devices placed in the home which continuously analyses radio signals using AI ‒ in this study it will be used to collect data on the patients’ speed, mobility and sleep quality.

Seth Ettenberg, president and CEO of BlueRock Therapeutics stated: “Parkinson’s disease is incredibly complex, with symptoms often varying hour to hour through the course of the day. New tools and approaches are needed to ease the reporting burden on patients in trials and to measure and assess disease progression more effectively. We are excited to be working with the pioneering teams at Rune Labs and Emerald Innovations to harness the power of their digital health technologies to collect an unbiased, objective and continuous measure of disease impact on function that will help us develop more effective therapies.”

James Spargo