Non-invasive spinal fluid test for the diagnosis of infant Meningitis
Bacterial meningitis in newborns is a serious issue, needing immediate diagnosis and treatment within hours to avoid death or permanent disability. A lumbar puncture to detect this disease is routine in the industrialized world where meningitis is suspected in around 1 in 100 births, costing the US >$400M p.a., where 97% of these lumbar punctures actually return negative for meningitis. However, in Africa’s “Meningitis Belt”, where lumbar puncture is anything but routine and where the disease is 20 times more frequent, 50% of infants die from the disease. Our non-invasive diagnostic tool for infant baterial meningitis can both reduce unnecessary lumbar punctures in developed countries, and be a game-changer for bacterial meningitis diagnosis and management in developing countries.
Project status
M+Visión project Jan 2013 – Sep 2015
Sector Infectious diseases in pediatrics. Nenonatal infant meningitis. Non invasive diagnostic tools.
Fellows
Javier Jiménez González (original team),
Ian Butterworth, Carlos Castro González (joined July 2013)
Berta Martí Fuster (joined Oct 2014)
Collaborators
Adelina Pellicer, Eva Valverde
Hospital Universitario La Paz
Fernando Cabañas
Hospital Universitario Quirón
César W. Ruiz
Hospital de Vall d’Hebrón
Loli Pérez
Hospital de Fuenlabrada
Quique Bassat
ISGlobal Barcelona – Centro de Investigación en Salud de Manhiça
Manuel Arroyo, Íñigo de la Pedraja, David Llanos
Hospital Clínico San Carlos
Luis Elvira, Óscar Martínez, Francisco Montero
CSIC ITEFI
Brian Anthony
MIT
Javier Romero, Sarah Murphy, Otto Rapalino
Massachusetts General Hospital
Ellen Grant, Deirdre O’Reilly, Janet Soul
Boston Children’s Hospital
Students
John Lee
MIT
Shiva Kant Shukla
CSIC
Disclosures
Acoustic Characterization of Superficial Body Fluids (MIT 17106J)
IE Business School Venture Day semi-finalists, 2013
Project selected for MIT Translational Fellows Program 2014-15 (represented by Javier Jiménez)
Awarded with the X Premios Madri+d a la mejor idea de Base Tecnologica, 2015
Currently, on the semi-finals of the MIT $100K Business Plan competition, 2015
Media and updates
In February, 2015, Team Lumbar won the madri+d Foundation for Knowledge Award. Read more+
In June 2014, Javier Jiménez González presented Team Lumbar’s project to the Biomedical Innovation Conference in Madrid: