Dextra

Reducing needle-based pain by immediately and reversibly cognitively disconnecting the patient from their pain.

Our brains use the combination of vision and touch to establish “body ownership”. Dextra leverages this cognitive mechanism by utilizing automated, patterned tactile inputs to cause the patient’s brain to take ownership of a proxy hand; putting the patient’s real hand into a state of cognitive neglect.

Inducing an immediate and reversible state of cognitive neglect reduces the perceived pain experienced by patients during needle procedures.

Dextra fits directly into the clinical workflow and provides a practical patient-facing service to improve procedural experience, support efficient care delivery, and reduce needle fear-related avoidance.

Why it matters:

Hand surgery is often completed under general or regional anesthesia, which increases the cost of care.  Wide-awake local anesthesia (WALANT) surgery is growing in popularity where sedation is eliminated completely. Dextra is poised to revolutionize how WALANT procedures are performed at the precipice of WALANT becoming the standard of care.

Dextra is poised to save tens of thousands of dollars per case by minimizing:

  • Anesthesia use

  • Operating Room (OR) time

  • Post-anesthesia recovery services

Because trigger finger injection has a defined clinical purpose and measurable symptom relief, it is a strong indication for demonstrating Dextra’s value as a marketable procedural adjunct. Beyond trigger finger and carpal tunnel release, we anticipate this will also be widely used for other procedures such as ganglion cyst excisions, De Quervain’s release, and fasciectomy for Dupuytren’s contractures.

  • IRB approved clinical study underway

  • Pilot cohort of trigger finger procedure recipients

    • ~30 point reduction in reported pain

    • Exceeds clinically meaningful pain reduction thresholds

    • Outperforms standard of care, needle-free and distraction comparators on the market

Evidence Highlights:

Embodied Theraputix LLC’s Dextra technology:

  • U.S. Patent Application [Pending] No. PCT/US2022/048824 Worldwide Application #WO2023081281A1, Marasco et. al., inventors

  • Cleveland Clinic Caregiver Catalyst #AF2019039 (2019)

  • State of Ohio iCorps@Ohio #60077921 (2020)

  • Ohio 3rd Frontier TVSF-1 (2021)