The Drawbridge device eliminates much of the inconvenience associated with blood diagnostics. The  painless procedure pricks skin, draws blood, stabilizes the blood  and elimninates the need for refrigeration.

Drawbridge Health is looking for a better way to get blood. Funded by General Electric’s entrepreneurial arm, GE Ventures, the company is working on a device that draws blood without the associated pain and anxiety and chemically stabilizes it for transport. The business believes this friendlier approach will increase patient compliance and simplify the diagnostic workflow.

“Drawbridge has taken blood chemistry stabilization technology from GE, and that is the heart of the device,” CEO Lee McCracken said. “Our handheld device is applied to the upper arm. Two buttons are pushed, the device pricks the skin and a few drops of blood flow into the device. It draws the blood, collects it into the chamber and allows it to go onto the strip of paper.”

The paper stabilizes the blood, eliminating the need for refrigeration and significantly extending the sample’s shelf life.

Drawbridge Health and Thorne Research’s subsidiary WellnessFX entered a collaborative agreement in December 2017 to enable wellness testing, anytime and anywhere, in the health and wellness market.

The strategic collaboration will provide Thorne Research and WellnessFX access to Drawbridge Health’s proprietary technology solution to integrate blood draw, collection and sample stabilization into a single device. Through the collaboration agreement, the companies will partner to develop solutions for improving the blood collection experience for health and wellness customers.

“The blood draw experience has long been the Achilles’ heel in the health and wellness market and we believe the Drawbridge solution has the potential to both improve the customer experience and provide health insights to more patients than ever before,” Thorne Research CEO Paul Jacobson said.

The Drawbridge device eliminates much of the inconvenience associated with blood diagnostics. The procedure could be done in a doctor’s office or even a patient’s home. The pain could be greatly reduced: McCracken describes a slight pinch.

Thorne Research and WellnessFX are leaders in the health and wellness industry, providing health diagnostics technology platforms to their healthcare consumers – enabling them to take control of their wellbeing.

“That cartridge can go in the regular mail” McCracken said. “It does not need to be Fed Ex’d, it does not need to be in cold storage. There’s none of that required because of the blood chemistry stabilization.

“Our strategic collaboration with Thorne brings tremendous value and validation to the Drawbridge platform,” McCracken said. “Partnering with a proven leader in the health and wellness industry opens the door to significant opportunities within this important and rapidly growing market segment.”

Drawbridge is not the only company looking to improve blood draws. Seventh Sense Biosystems markets a painless system. Velano Vascular has a needle-free approach. But Drawbridge believes their stabilization technology gives them an edge. VTN