Arizona, October 25, 2022– NeoLight has signed an agreement to acquire the Pacifier Activated Lullaby (PAL®) System by Powers Medical Inc., a US-based medical technology company that focuses on musical therapy in the newborn baby market. This acquisition strengthens the NeoLight neonatal portfolio by introducing a solution for two growing concerns in newborn care; Non-nutritive sucking (NNS) and Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome (drug-addicted babies).
The PAL system encourages and reinforces effective non-nutritive sucking of premature infants. This is accomplished by giving positive feedback to the infant in the form of music or a mother’s voice as auditory input in direct response to sucking.
Non-nutritive sucking in general has significant benefits for infants – studies suggest that it reduces the time infants need to transition from tube or oral feeding, and from start of oral feeding to full oral feeding. It also reduces the length of hospital stay. In a recent randomized clinical trial performed at Vanderbilt, it was found that premature babies who received interventional therapy combined with their mother’s voice with the PAL system were able to have their feeding tubes removed a full week earlier, were able to consume milk two times more, had significantly shorter hospital stays than babies who did not receive intervention.
“Powers has already sold the device to the top 50 children’s hospitals in the US. UCLA recently published their great experience with PAL System and how it has helped their patients improve. It is an honor to advance an innovative technology like PAL System from the 50 to the 2700 hospitals nationwide” said Vivek Kopparthi, NeoLight’s Co-founder & Executive Chairman.
“The acquisition of the PAL System re-emphasizes our commitment to the newborn care industry and perfectly fits into our portfolio of cutting-edge innovations for the space.” Said Arik Anderson, NeoLight’s CEO.
“Given our NICU focus and 90 country reach, we are excited to deploy the PAL product as quickly as possible worldwide to continue our efforts to bring innovative healthcare to babies around the world.” Said MaryBeth Smith, NeoLight’s Chief Commercial Officer.
“I am excited for the future of the PAL system with NeoLight, and their extensive commercial abilities and I am proud of the innovative work done by Powers Medical in creating and demonstrating the tremendous capabilities of the PAL system to help these babies that need our care.” Patricia D. Palmer, Powers Medical CEO
Powers Device Technologies, Inc., a Florida-based medical device company, develops therapeutic and diagnostic feedback sensor products to address the nutritional and distress tolerance (soothing) needs of preterm, full term, and critical care infants.
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NeoLight is a medical device company that develops empathy driven, best-in-class technologies for treating preventable conditions in the newborn care market. Empathy driven solutions are a framework that has the doctor-nurse-mother-infant ecosystem at the center. It fosters the emotional connection that happens, thereby providing not just treatment but also providing care. Driving neonatal care beyond the traditional hospital setting, NeoLight is also creating a robust home market to treat neonatal conditions in the home. To learn more, visit www.theneolight.com and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.
