May 8, 2019   SOURCE: BusinessWire

Texas-based Start-up MedCognition® to Develop Military Medical Training Modules for US Army Using PerSim® Augmented Reality Patient Simulator System

MedCognition, a Texas-based start-up, is collaborating with Chenega Healthcare Services on a military medicine education and training initiative for the US Army. MedCognition will create military-relevant trauma training modules using its PerSim® augmented reality patient simulator system to support tactical combat casualty care and emulate battlefield and mass casualty incident injuries as part of the $750,000 development contract. MedCognition will develop the training modules over the next 12 months with the potential to be adopted by the US Military in the years to come.

The PerSim augmented reality patient simulator system provides dynamic realism in medical simulation training using Microsoft HoloLens® Mixed reality to project life-like holographic patients into actual work environments. PerSim allows participants to view realistic patient simulations with a number of clinical presentations including respiratory distress, stroke and minor trauma, and is currently used by pre-hospital training programs to strengthen critical thinking, decision-making and assessment skills of trainees.

“Experiential learning is a cornerstone of providing quality patient care and potentially preventing medical errors, especially in a frantic and stressful environment like pre-hospital,” commented US Army Combat Veteran Physician and CEO of MedCognition, Dr. Kevin King. “MedCognition delivers affordable, realistic and portable tools for first responders and healthcare clinicians to learn through hands-on experience. Instead of classrooms or on-screen training modules, PerSim empowers educators and trainees to practice caring for critically ill patients with the tools and in the actual environments where they deliver care. This contract expands our capabilities into military medicine and battlefield care, with the hope that this could help save the lives of critically ill and injured soldiers.”

Founded in 2016, MedCognition was developed by Emergency Medicine clinicians, educators and computer scientists through a partnership with UT Health San Antonio and UTSA. The company’s PerSim augmented reality patient simulation system is used by medical educators and trainers in healthcare sectors including pre-hospital, first responder and emergency medicine. The PerSim system was recognized by EMS World Magazine as an Innovation of the Year in 2018.

Chenega Healthcare Services is an 8(a) Small Disadvantaged Business (SDB), wholly-owned subsidiary of the Chenega Corporation, an Alaska Native Corporation (ANC), with extensive experience in healthcare services, medical research, and program management.