FUELING INNOVATION at Children’s Hospital Colorado
Dear Friend, Children’s Hospital Colorado is filled with relentless problem-solvers who are intent on making the world better for kids. Our team continually asks, “What if?” They push limits and reject boundaries. They are visionaries and disruptors, constantly seeking ways to improve our patients’ lives. Here, we know an idea has the potential to change a child’s future. Those ideas are sparked by notes scribbled on a napkin, by taking a look into a microscope, and by standing at a patient’s bedside, pondering how we can make his or her life better. When Children’s Colorado launched the Center for Innovation in 2016, we provided the catalyst and resources to bring life-changing ideas to reality. Today, our team is helping to create prototypes and products, medical technologies and devices, digital monitors and drugs — innovations that are already impacting children’s health. We’re experiencing an exciting new frontier where pediatric medicine and academic research join forces to bring forward groundbreaking solutions that can generate resources to reinvest right back into our noble mission. These innovations will benefit our own patients and countless other children — and even adults — worldwide. As you read about the transformative ideas and entrepreneurial products being developed at Children’s Colorado, we hope you’ll be inspired to shape the future of children’s health by supporting innovation. Your generous donations help to turn ideas into promising solutions that will benefit kids for generations to come.
Will you join us?
Jennifer Roe Darling President and CEO Children’s Hospital Colorado Foundation
CONTENTS 2 6 7 10 12
About the Center for Innovation Why Support Innovation? Innovation Spotlight: Triple Endoscopy Innovation Spotlight: Button Huggie How to Help
A Children’s Hospital Colorado patient plays a virtual reality game
Children’s Hospital Colorado’s
CENTER FOR INNOVATION
At Children’s Hospital Colorado, we are innovators and collaborators. Boundary-pushers and paradigm-shifters. Pediatric experts with big ideas, a heart for kids and a relentless drive to do whatever it takes to improve children’s health. Here, we believe innovation can change lives. So, if there’s an idea that can improve pediatric medicine as we know it, we’ll do everything we can to make it a reality today. That’s the spirit behind the Center for Innovation, where we’re bringing bold ideas to life to benefit kids in our care and those around the world. Join us and help innovation thrive at Children’s Colorado.
What is the Center For Innovation? The Center for Innovation is a leading health innovation hub at Children’s Hospital Colorado that is transforming pediatric medicine. Here, creative caregivers and companies can turn their ideas into life-changing health care innovations and bring them to market — all with comprehensive support from campus collaborators, startup experts and venture specialists. By harnessing promising ideas and accelerating their path to market launch, we give in-house innovators and external entrepreneurs the resources and support to significantly improve pediatric care. Not only does the Center for Innovation help to foster homegrown ideas from our 10,000+ expert team members, it also supports the co-development of pediatric innovations with external companies and startups. With our experienced team of innovation partners on the Anschutz Medical Campus, including CU Innovations, we are paving the way for groundbreaking new therapies, products and technologies that benefit kids here and around the world. It takes significant resources and infrastructure to turn an idea into a tangible product that benefits patients. That’s why philanthropy is absolutely critical to our success. With your support, we can continue to develop innovations that push boundaries, shift paradigms, improve lives and bring about transformative changes for children’s health.
The Right Place, The Right Time The paradigm is shifting in health care. Consumers, companies and caregivers are taking advantage of the explosion in new digital technologies to reimagine health care delivery, finding trailblazing ways to provide more effective care at a lower cost. The opportunities are boundless, but getting new innovations to patients continues to prove challenging.
The health and future of our children depends on innovation, and there’s no one better suited to design those innovations than the people on the Anschutz Medical Campus. Our team is putting countless hours into solving some of the most challenging problems in child health. Together, we can change the face of pediatric health care.” JENA HAUSMANN President and CEO Children’s Hospital Colorado
The Anschutz Medical Campus is optimally positioned to accelerate medical breakthroughs. With our partners at UCHealth and CU Innovations, our campus has the talent, the expertise, the technology and the facilities to radically transform health care as we know it. By leveraging our collective talent and resources, we can accelerate discoveries to become a global leader in medical innovation.
2
FUELING INNOVATION
CHILDRENSCOLORADOFOUNDATION.ORG/INNOVATION
3
How We Turn IDEAS Into Fostering Homegrown Ideas From The Brightest Medical Minds
Co-Developing Products with External Companies
Children’s Colorado is home to a renowned team of doctors, caregivers and researchers who know their pediatric specialty areas better than anyone else. Not only does the Center for Innovation help Children’s Colorado to recruit and retain its world-class team, it also gives our pediatric experts a systematic path to cultivate their ideas into viable, scalable ventures.
With our infrastructure and expertise, Children’s Colorado is optimally positioned to partner with like-minded innovators from Colorado and other states, helping them to build and clinically validate new health care concepts for the pediatric market where they can make a difference in kids’ lives.
From proof of concept and incubation to market launch and acceleration, the Center for Innovation helps our team members to bring their brilliant ideas to the front lines of clinical care. Whether the idea is a medical device, diagnostic tool or digital health technology, we provide the infrastructure and expertise to guide innovators every step of the way. After an idea is evaluated for viability and strategic fit, our in-house innovators receive comprehensive support from the Center of Innovation to bring their concept forward, including:
Mentorship: The Center for Innovation team includes some of the brightest minds in business formation, medicine and technology. Our Entrepreneurin-Residence and other experts provide the experience and vision to get great ideas off the ground. Their guidance is tremendously helpful in navigating the many hurdles of business development — everything from refining a product pitch for investors to coordinating supply chain logistics and distributing a product to consumers and clinicians.
REALITY
Legal Expertise: Many of our in-house innovators have extensive medical and patient experience but lack the business background to bring a new product to market. The Center for Innovation team provides access to regulatory, investment and legal resources, including guidance on issues like the patent process, regulatory approvals, intellectual property management and technology transfer.
Partnerships: The Center for Innovation connects innovators with campus-wide collaborators and health care companies that are working on complementary technologies. With an extensive network of partners nationwide, we connect our innovators with potential funders and industry allies. These invaluable partnerships help ideas to move from concept to patient bedside far more quickly and effectively.
“Tech companies often come to us with great ideas, but they operate outside our walls. They don’t always understand how to get a new technology to a pediatric patient or how to optimize it for the hospital setting,” says Dr. Robin Deterding, the Center for Innovation’s Medical Director. “Co-developing innovations with other companies is a new way to think about investing in kids and our mission.” Children’s Colorado treats more children than any other hospital in the region, and we have a robust data infrastructure and research program in place. This allows for effective development and clinical validation of pediatric health care concepts, so we can more quickly bring new innovations into practice and care.
Since launching in 2016, the Center for Innovation has made rapid progress in advancing pediatric health.
You can have a great idea, but actually launching that idea requires a lot of work. You need business expertise and connections. You need people who can help you to refine a pitch. You need capital so you can get your idea to market. That’s what we do here. Through the Center for Innovation, Children’s Hospital Colorado is becoming a leading force in supporting transformative innovations that improve children’s health.” DR. ROBIN DETERDING
WANT TO KNOW MORE? We’d love to introduce you to the innovators who are transforming pediatric medicine. Call 720-777-1777 to schedule a visit.
By the Numbers
Center for Innovation Medical Director Breathing Institute Director at Children’s Hospital Colorado Ed and Roxanne Fie Anderson Family Endowed Chair for Breathing
6
start-ups launched with Center for Innovation support
130
external company idea submissions
$5.2M
in venture capital funding raised by Children’s Colorado startups
300+
companies evaluated for potential partnerships
5
Why Support Innovation? When it comes to pediatric health care innovations, the potential return on investment is exponential. The innovations we develop today have an immediate impact on care, and many will have a long-term effect over a patient’s lifespan.
Here are the top ways that your philanthropic investment makes a difference at the Center for Innovation: 1 Transforming Access to Care: Millions of
5 Helping Kids Thrive: The earlier we can make
2 Improving Health Care Quality and Safety:
6 Supporting Caregivers: The Center for
3 Lowering Health Care Costs: Health care costs
7 Expanding Our Business Base: The products
children lack access to high-quality pediatric care, but digital health technologies have the potential to transform the current landscape. Your support fosters innovations that allow families to share health data and get medical recommendations from leading pediatric experts, even when they live far away. Our team has a long history of pioneering transformative discoveries that make care better, safer and more effective for kids. But it can take years to get an idea to a clinical setting where it benefits patients. Your support gets breakthroughs from the lab to the bedside more quickly, so they can help kids who need them today.
have skyrocketed across the nation, but our team is committed to developing less-invasive, more efficient ways of practicing medicine. Not only does this mean less pain and time in the hospital for patients, it also helps to reduce health care costs.
4 Making a Worldwide Impact: Our innovations do far more than benefit the patients in our care. When we develop a new technology that improves lives, we share our knowledge with caregivers everywhere to help children around the globe.
How Ideas are
CHANGING LIVES
a difference in a child’s life, the healthier that child will be, now and in the future. This is also true for entire communities, so when we develop technologies that encourage healthy behaviors or emphasize prevention, we help broader populations of children to live healthier lives. Innovation helps medical providers by giving them the tools and technologies to support the best possible health outcomes. By putting the right information at our caregivers’ fingertips and sharing data that empowers good decisions, we improve care while avoiding provider burnout, a common problem in health care today. developed through the Center for Innovation have the potential to diversify revenue for Children’s Colorado, which faces an increasingly challenging financial landscape. These funds are then reinvested to support our nonprofit mission, funding areas like research and family support services.
8 Supporting Economic Development:
Co-developing innovations and launching successful companies supports job growth and boosts the local economy — all while supporting kids’ health.
Donating to the Innovation Fund supports the infrastructure, experts and resources needed to make innovation thrive at Children’s Hospital Colorado. Read more about how you can make a difference on page 12, or visit ChildrensColoradoFoundation.org/innovation 6
FUELING INNOVATION
With support from the Center for Innovation, Dr. Joel Friedlander pioneered a new way to do endoscopy tests on kids that eliminates the need for sedation. Read more on page 8.
7
“ We need to ask, ‘Why not?’ and not always do things the same way. We can’t push medicine forward unless we ask what could be possible, foster those ideas and then turn them into reality.”
INNOVATION SPOTLIGHT
How One Doctor’s ‘Crazy Idea’ Made an Invasive Test Much Easier
DR. JOEL FRIEDLANDER Pediatric Gastroenterologist at Children’s Hospital Colorado
Dr. Joel Friedlander comes from a family of tinkerers. He vividly remembers spending many days of his youth building model cars with his father and grandfather. As a teenager, he built a radio station, although the frequency traveled only about three blocks, he admits with a laugh.
Building a Better Endoscopy for Kids “I’m in the operating room with ENTs and pulmonologists every week,” Dr. Friedlander says. “We noticed that we all have different pediatric scopes that are used for different things. Our team realized that we could take an ENT technique and use a pulmonary scope to fulfill our EoE patients’ endoscopy needs. The idea just grew from working together.”
“I love to play around with things,” Dr. Friedlander says. “My wife jokes that when I go to sleep, my brain doesn’t turn off.” As a pediatric gastroenterologist with an inventor’s mind, it’s not surprising that Dr. Friedlander would look for new, better ways to care for his young patients at Children’s Hospital Colorado. “Innovation is important because medicine is not just about working within the parameters of what we know. It’s also about thinking outside the box,” he says.
Asking ‘Why Not?’ Many of Dr. Friedlander’s patients have a condition called eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE), which is chronic inflammation of the esophagus triggered by food allergies. Patients with EoE experience a range of symptoms including failure to thrive, abdominal and chest pain, and feeding or swallowing issues. Currently, there is no cure for EoE, and patients require lifelong monitoring. Diagnosis and subsequent monitoring of EoE require an endoscopy of the upper gastrointestinal tract. Performed under heavy sedation or anesthesia, the procedure entails inserting a tiny camera and biopsy tool down a patient’s throat. Although necessary for EoE patients, the procedure is costly, must be done frequently and, due to sedation, it comes with additional risks and time spent at the hospital.
Dr. Friedlander’s innovation helps Haylie to avoid anesthesia when undergoing regular endoscopy testing.
8
FUELING INNOVATION
Adults with EoE are able to receive a nasal endoscopy, in which the scope is inserted through the nose instead of the throat, so it can be performed without sedation. Unfortunately, nasal endoscopy imaging tools were always too big for pediatric use — that is, until Dr. Friedlander’s self-described “crazy idea.”
How does the transnasal endoscopy improve care for kids?
1 Hour
Average time from admission to discharge compared to 4 hours for a sedated endoscopy
1/3
The cost of sedated endoscopy
2 Hours Without eating instead of 10 hours of food restrictions with general anesthesia
This new approach, officially called transnasal esophagoscopy/endoscopy with biopsies, was pioneered by Dr. Friedlander, along with his colleagues Dr. Robin Deterding, Dr. Emily DeBoer and Dr. Jeremy Prager. With the new technique, patients receive a numbing nose spray in the clinic. Then they slip on a pair of virtual reality goggles to distract them while a caregiver gently glides a tiny camera and biopsy tool within a flexible scope through the nose, into their esophagus. The pioneering procedure has been validated through patient trials at Children’s Colorado. The procedure takes about eight minutes, dramatically cutting costs. And with no anesthesia, it reduces what was a full day at the hospital down to a one-hour appointment, so children can often return to school the same day. These improvements have made a tremendous difference for patients like Haylie, who requires frequent endoscopes but is allergic to anesthesia. “It has worked out amazingly,” says Michelle Nielsen, Haylie’s mom. “It obviously saves us from the worry of going under. It’s so fast.” So far, doctors from more than a dozen other hospitals around the country have traveled to Children’s Colorado to learn the new endoscopy technique and bring it back to their patients.
Making the Impossible, Possible While the new technique was successful, it was initially “piecemealed together” with existing tools. Further improvements meant creating an entirely new device — one that could be brought to market to improve care for children around the world. Fortunately, Dr. Friedlander and his colleagues had access to the Center for Innovation and campus partners at CU Innovations. With their support and mentoring, Triple Endoscopy, Inc., was founded in 2017 to manufacture and market the new device and procedure. Triple Endoscopy plans to commercially launch its first medical device, described as a turn-key system that includes an improved pediatric endoscope, a transnasal endoscope distraction system and all the necessary software, by the end of 2020. “It’s incredible to be a part of this with my team and all that we have learned through the Center for Innovation,” Friedlander says. “We’re making the impossible, possible.” CHILDRENSCOLORADOFOUNDATION.ORG/INNOVATION
9
INNOVATION SPOTLIGHT
When Frustration Leads to a Better Way Sometimes innovation originates from a spark of inspiration. Other times, it’s borne out of frustration. When Dr. Steve Moulton frequently overheard nurses and parents complaining about a multitude of issues related to securing and maintaining gastrostomy buttons, he realized there must be a better way. A gastrostomy button or “g-button” is a surgically placed device that allows nutrition or medication to be delivered directly into a patient’s stomach. G-buttons are mainly used for kids who have trouble eating or swallowing to assist with weight gain, nutrition and hydration — all with the goal of improving a patient’s quality of life.
What is a Button Huggie? Disposable, long-wearing, base layer with skin-friendly adhesive
Frequent dressing changes can cause the button to move inside the gastrostomy tract, causing a host of complications including pain, leaking, infections, scarring and even dislodgement. With more than 2,000 g-buttons being placed or replaced each year at Children’s Colorado — and no good way to keep the site clean and device secure — it’s no wonder Dr. Moulton kept hearing about issues with them. “I realized that tape and gauze were not an adequate solution for securing these devices,” he says. “I kept thinking to myself, there must be a way to fix this problem.”
“I have always thought that frustration, or the identification of problems, is really an opportunity,” says Dr. Moulton, who is the director of the pediatric trauma and burn programs at Children’s Hospital Colorado and the Colorado Firefighters Endowed Chair for Burn and Trauma Care.
A Common Procedure with Costly Complications Placing a g-button is one of the most common surgical procedures performed on children. Unfortunately, Emergency Room visits and hospital readmissions after placement are also common and costly.
Replaceable, absorbent gauze pad
Design allows for ventilation of the area
G-buttons are supposed to make things easier on patients, but it’s difficult to keep the skin around a g-button clean without affecting its placement. Parents are taught to place a gauze pad under their child’s g-button and secure the device with four strips of tape that are fashioned into a tic-tac-toe pattern. The dressing must be changed once a day — sometimes more often — and requires the tape to be peeled off the skin, which can be uncomfortable and irritating.
A securement solution for “g-buttons”, which deliver nutrition and medications to patients Far superior to tape and gauze Prevents common g-button complications like dislodgement and discomfort Only one of its kind; no other g-button securement method is on the market
Dr. Steve Moulton pioneered a better way to keep transabdominal feeding tubes in place.
10
FUELING INNOVATION
Washable reusable lid
When Good Enough is Not Good Enough
Dr. Moulton has always enjoyed working with problems until he eventually teases out a solution. That drive to answer unmet needs led him to form two companies to commercialize other innovations. His newest innovation is the Button Huggie, a g-button securement device the size of a small matchbox. The Button Huggie is far superior to tape and gauze because it uses a reusable lid and long-wearing base layer with skin-friendly adhesive to prevent the g-button from moving inside the gastrostomy tract. It is easy to use and maintain, simplifying care, and the design prevents dislodgement and other complications, while also reducing health care costs. Dr. Moulton worked with a group of graduate engineering students from the University of Colorado to develop the device and create a series of prototypes for clinical testing. With support from the Center for Innovation, he founded his third company, Ezalife, LLC, with the intent to manufacture and sell the Button Huggie.
An Award-Winning Solution The Button Huggie has won several innovation awards, including the top honor at the 2019 Children’s Colorado Pediatric Innovation Challenge. The $40,000 grand prize is providing critical funding while the product moves through the final design phase. To validate the device’s effectiveness, Dr. Moulton will soon launch a 12-week randomized control trial with 200 patients at Children’s Colorado and Phoenix Children’s Hospital comparing the old “tic-tac-toe” dressing method to the Button Huggie. The Button Huggie is expected to be available for distribution by the end of 2019.
2019 Pediatric Innovation Challenge Grand Prize Winner
“I believe the Button Huggie is going to revolutionize the care and management of g-buttons,” says Dr. Moulton.
CHILDRENSCOLORADOFOUNDATION.ORG/INNOVATION
11
SUPPORT THE NEXT
BIG IDEA
The capital required to launch a life-changing innovation is significant. Donor support is absolutely critical to Children’s Hospital Colorado’s ability to transform pediatric health care through innovation. Since Children’s Colorado is a non-profit, giving to the Innovation Fund provides for the supporting infrastructure and team of experts who make the Center for Innovation’s work possible. Donors fuel the critical resources and business, legal and medical experts we need to scale novel ideas into successful products, therapies and technologies that will benefit young patients worldwide. Your tax-deductible donation to the Children’s Colorado Innovation Fund supports: SEED FUNDING to pilot and scale new ideas LEGAL EXPERTISE for patents and intellectual
property protection
AN ENTREPRENEUR-IN-RESIDENCE and other
business experts to provide valuable guidance and mentorship
DATA ANALYTICS to evaluate clinical viability
of concepts
PARTNERSHIPS with campus-wide collaborators
and external companies
HOW TO HELP For more information on how you can support the Innovation Fund, contact Sharon McMeel at 720-777-1777 or smcmeel@childrenscoloradofoundation.org. Donate online today: ChildrensColoradoFoundation.org/innovation
Your donation of $250 or more to the Innovation Fund may qualify for the state of Colorado Enterprise Zone Tax Credit. Colorado residents who make qualifying gifts are eligible for a generous tax credit of up to 25% to use against their state income for outright gifts of cash or a 12.5% state income tax credit for gifts of appreciated securities. Learn more about the Colorado Enterprise Zone Tax Credit at ChildrensColoradoFoundation.org/EZ Note: This information is of a general nature and should not be construed as legal, accounting or tax advice. Every taxpayer’s situation is different and tax laws are constantly changing. Please consult a tax advisor prior to taking any action based on this information.
12
FUELING INNOVATION
We’re challenging the status quo, asking
“Why not?”
and pushing beyond the boundaries of what’s possible. With your support, the opportunities for innovation are boundless—just like the potential impact on children’s lives.
Anschutz Medical Campus 13123 E. 16th Avenue, Box 045 Aurora, CO 80045
NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATION U.S. POSTAGE PAID DENVER, CO PERMIT NO. 3280