URMC Brings Next Generation, AI-Powered Ultrasound to New Point-of-Care Settings to Improve Patient Care, Medical Education and Research
GUILFORD, Conn. and ROCHESTER, January 11, 2022- Butterfly Network, Inc. (NYSE: BFLY), a digital health company transforming care with next generation, point-of-care ultrasound (“POCUS”), and the University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC), upstate New York’s largest and most comprehensive healthcare system, today announced that the organizations will work together to bring Butterfly Blueprint™, a system-wide ultrasound platform, to the URMC enterprise.
“Our evolving relationship with Butterfly will offer a unique opportunity to leverage URMC’s clinical and academic expertise in collaboration with an innovative health technology company to advance the frontiers of bedside decision-making,” said Dr. Michael F. Rotondo, CEO of the University of Rochester Medical Faculty Group and Vice Dean for Clinical Affairs at the University’s School of Medicine and Dentistry. “Working together with Butterfly, research teams throughout the University can explore the potential of acquiring image data and deploying artificial intelligence to improve patient care, medical education and clinical management.”
Validated research has shown that point of care ultrasonography improves initial diagnostic accuracy and can reduce downstream referrals and imaging costs. In addition, the use of bedside imaging as part of the initial assessment within the primary care setting has resulted in a change in diagnosis across 49.4% of patients and a change in care management across 50.9%.
“The vast majority of care decisions are made with incomplete information. With Butterfly, seeing is knowing, and the advantage of having an easily accessible, easy to use, AI-enabled imaging tool in the pocket of every practitioner means more informed, better decisions can be made earlier in care, every time,” said Dr. Todd Fruchterman, Butterfly Network's President and Chief Executive Officer. “The University of Rochester Medical Center is a leader in healthcare excellence; we’re thrilled to partner with them to transform care decision-making and to demonstrate the power of AI-enabled, point-of-care ultrasound across the enterprise. We believe that the leadership of URMC and other organizations that are committed to advancing medicine through technology, education, and the power of AI, will create a new standard of care.”
“The deployment of innovative ultrasound technology has the potential to redefine the point of care clinical standard and serve as an enhancement to the use of the stethoscope,” said Dr. David L. Waldman, Chief Medical IT Development Officer and former Chair of Imaging Sciences at URMC. “Enterprise deployment of point of care ultrasound will ultimately enable every clinician, across all departments, to quickly image patients where they are located.”
URMC officials said they expect to roll out Butterfly Blueprint™ and begin educating employees this summer, and will begin providing the company’s handheld imaging units this fall to second-and third-year medical students, UR Medicine primary care providers, and UR Medicine Home Care nurses. In future planned phases, URMC and Butterfly Network expect to pursue multiple research projects to explore and validate the use of Butterfly Blueprint™ across the enterprise. Innovative image analysis, AI, and clinical pathways will be major aspects of research. Clinical areas of focus will include education and curriculum for point-of-care ultrasound, the creation of encounter-based workflows, development of best practices for system deployment, infrastructure integration, compliance, quality assurance, and three-dimensional procedural guidance.
To learn more about Butterfly technology and to view a demo of Butterfly iQ+, the world's first handheld, single probe whole-body ultrasound system using semiconductor technology please visit: https://www.butterflynetwork.com/. For more information on the University of Rochester Medical Center, visit https://www.urmc.rochester.edu .
One of the nation’s leading academic medical centers, URMC forms the centerpiece of the University of Rochester’s health research, teaching and patient care missions. The University’s School of Medicine and Dentistry is in the top one-quarter of U.S. medical centers in federal research funding. As upstate New York’s premier health care delivery network, patients benefit from the Medical Center’s robust teaching and biomedical research programs, and its status as a nationally recognized leader in digital health and innovation. The University’s health care delivery network is anchored by Strong Memorial Hospital, an 886-bed, University-owned teaching hospital designated by the New York State Department of Health as a Level One Regional Trauma and Burn Center and home to Western New York’s only cardiac transplant program. With more than 26,000 part- and full-time employees, the Medical Center is the largest single component of the Rochester region’s leading employer. For more information, visit URMC at https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/.
Founded by Dr. Jonathan Rothberg in 2011, and recently listed on the New York Stock Exchange through a business combination with Longview Acquisition Corp., Butterfly created the world's first handheld, single probe whole-body ultrasound system using semiconductor technology, the Butterfly iQ+. Butterfly's mission is to democratize medical imaging and contribute to the aspiration of global health equity, making high-quality ultrasound affordable, easy-to-use, globally accessible, and intelligently connected, including for the 4.7 billion people around the world lacking access to ultrasound. Through its proprietary Ultrasound-on-Chip™ technology, Butterfly is paving the way for earlier detection and remote management of health conditions around the world. The Butterfly iQ+ can be purchased online today by healthcare practitioners in the United States, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.
Butterfly Blueprint™ supports healthcare systems by giving them access to new, diagnostically-meaningful clinical information at the bedside while helping to support procedure availability and expediency across care settings. By pairing the world’s first handheld, easy-to-use, whole-body ultrasound probe with intuitive, mobile-first workflow unlocks powerful new uses for ultrasound across the care continuum—it does for imaging what the stethoscope did for auscultation. This solution is enabled through a dedicated customer experience team and proven processes that include solution advisory, implementation services, and post-go-live support.
The Butterfly iQ+ probe is a prescription device intended for trained healthcare professionals only.
Butterfly Network, Inc. Forward Looking Statements This press release includes "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the "safe harbor" provisions of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Butterfly's actual results may differ from its expectations, estimates, and projections and, consequently, you should not rely on these forward-looking statements as predictions of future events. Words such as "expect," "estimate," "project," "budget," "forecast," "anticipate," "intend," 'plan,' "may," "will," "could," "should," "believes," "predicts," "potential," "continue," and similar expressions (or the negative versions of such words or expressions) are intended to identify such forward- looking statements. These forward-looking statements include, without limitation, Butterfly's goals and expectations with respect to its strategic partnership with University of Rochester Medical Center, and Butterfly's development and commercialization efforts and business plans under the caption "About Butterfly Network." These forward-looking statements involve significant risks and uncertainties that could cause the actual results to differ materially from those discussed in the forward-looking statements. Most of these factors are outside of Butterfly's control and are difficult to predict. Factors that may cause such differences include, but are not limited to: the impact of COVID-19 on Butterfly's business; the ability to recognize the anticipated benefits of its business combination with Longview Acquisition Corp.; Butterfly's ability to grow and manage growth profitably; the success, cost and timing of Butterfly's product and service development activities; the potential attributes and benefits of Butterfly's products and services; Butterfly's ability to obtain and maintain regulatory approval for its products, and any related restrictions and limitations of any approved product; Butterfly's ability to identify, in-license or acquire additional technology; Butterfly's ability to maintain its existing license, manufacture, supply and distribution agreements; Butterfly's ability to compete with other companies currently marketing or engaged in the development of products and services that Butterfly is currently marketing or developing; changes in applicable laws or regulations; the size and growth potential of the markets for Butterfly's products and services, and its ability to serve those markets, either alone or in partnership with others; the pricing of Butterfly's products and services and reimbursement for medical procedures conducted using its products and services; Butterfly's estimates regarding expenses, revenue, capital requirements and needs for additional financing; Butterfly's financial performance; Butterfly's ability to raise financing in the future; and other risks and uncertainties indicated from time to time in Butterfly's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Butterfly cautions that the foregoing list of factors is not exclusive. Butterfly cautions you not to place undue reliance upon any forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this press release. Butterfly does not undertake or accept any obligation or undertake to release publicly any updates or revisions to any forward-looking statements to reflect any change in Butterfly's expectations or any change in events, conditions or circumstances on which any such statement is based.
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