Australian digital health company PainChek recently announced that the United States Patent Office has issued a Notice of Allowance for its pain assessment invention. This means that patent prosecution has been successfully completed. 

The U.S. patent, when granted, gives PainChek exclusive rights to exclude others from making, using, selling or importing the invention for 20 years from the filing date in the United States (Feb. 17, 2017).

THE LARGER TREND

In May 2019, the federal government of Australia announced that it will invest A$5M to facilitate the implementation of PainChek’s pain recognition app in Australian residential aged care centres. The app provides caregivers and health professionals with an efficient, smartphone-based system that applies artificial intelligence (AI) to determine a person’s pain using facial recognition analytics. With the funding, more than 1,000 Residential Aged Care Providers in Australia and their 100,000 residents living with dementia will be able to use a licensed version of the PainChek app for a year.

PainChek is also on track to obtain United States FDA De Novo regulatory clearance in 2020. The De Novo process provides a regulatory pathway for PainChek to market the adult version app in the U.S. In addition, the company is completing national filings for the same patent in Australia, China, Europe, Japan and the United Kingdom.

ON THE RECORD

“After working on this application since early 2017, our team is delighted with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) grant. The PainChek technology effectively gives a voice to people who can’t verbalise their pain and this patent will further expand our commercial efforts,” said Philip Daffas, CEO of PainChek.

“Our ongoing De Novo application confirms we are a first in kind from a regulatory standpoint and the granting of the U.S. patent confirms that we are first in kind from an intellectual property standpoint.”