(Madera, California) – Valley Children’s Healthcare, in partnership with The Innovation Institute, will host a first-ever virtual Pediatric Innovation Showcase on Thursday, May 20. The virtual gathering will allow participants to hear directly from cutting-edge companies from around the country - and right here in our Valley - about their approaches to solving pediatric healthcare problems, to spark innovative thinking and more new ideas. The event is sponsored by Medline, the nation’s largest privately held manufacturer and supplier of medical supplies and is open to healthcare providers, students, aspiring innovators, families and anyone with an interest in improving care for kids.
“Our team strives to provide the best care for kids every day and that is only possible because of their incredible skills, deep compassion for kids, and an unwillingness to leave even the most complex problem unsolved. This is the essence of what this event will highlight,” says Valley Children’s Healthcare President and CEO Todd Suntrapak.
Valley Children’s and the Innovation Lab have worked together to bring this showcase to our region. In October of 2019, Valley Children’s launched a partnership with The Innovation Institute, a national, independent medical product incubator and healthcare services provider, to spark innovation across the health network. The Institute’s Innovation Lab is staffed with scientists, doctors and commercialization experts who evaluate ideas, build prototypes, protect them, license them and then take them to market directly or through industry partners. Valley Children’s innovation program, known as George’s Idea Lab, operates as part of The Innovation Lab.
“We will spotlight the imaginative and impactful work under way by startups focused on our youngest patients, while helping to close the gap in our underserved pediatric population, “says Suzy Engwall, Innovation Lab National Director, Western Region. “If you’re a parent with a child who needs medical attention, all you want is a solution for your child. The pace of innovation and change for pediatric patients, however, hasn’t kept in step with the broader marketplace, leaving opportunities for breakthrough ideas.”
Startups to Showcase Opportunities
The program will feature a spotlight demonstration from one of Valley Children’s own nurses, Jennifferre Mancillas, RN. The longtime neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) nurse founded Lumify Care, a nurse-led startup dedicated to developing innovative tools and resources frontline workers need to improve patient experience. Lumify Care recently released one of their own inventions called the “uNight Light,” the first-ever wearable LED light designed to help nurses see their workspaces while minimizing sleep disturbances for patients.
One dozen startup representatives will also speak on ideas in development and offer demonstrations of products already on the market. With a common theme of technology, those innovations include a state-of-the-art robot companion programmed by child development experts, a vital signs monitor that can shorten hospital stays and a wearable health and wellness tracker.
Among those are several ideas that funneled through the Lab, including a pint-sized and friendly hospital transport device known as the Imagination Wagon and a mobile application in development to encourage children with autism spectrum disorder to perform everyday life skills on their own.
Additional partners supporting the event include RedCrow, which specializes in funding healthcare startups; ScaleHealth, a healthcare innovation ecosystem; KidsX, aimed at accelerating pediatric innovation; and Children’s Healthcare of Orange County, which, like Valley Children’s and the Lab, is another Innovation Institute family member.
Valley Children’s Pediatric Innovation Showcase
Thursday, May 20, 2021
10 – 11:30 a.m.
Location: Virtual
No cost to participate
To learn more about the Valley Children’s Pediatric Innovation Showcase and to register, please visit www.valleychildrens.org/classes-and-events/showcase.