This marks the second collaboration of this kind for the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based company. Last fall, it launched the first “Brain Health Collaboratory” with West Virginia University Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute (RNI).
Now, the company has a new partner in Ochsner, a leading health system serving Louisiana, Mississippi and the Gulf South. Together, they hope to work on new approaches to treating cognitive decline and Alzheimer’s disease.
This collaboration establishes the region’s first platform for non-invasive brain health innovation, Cognito said in a news release. It combines Cognito’s investigational Spectris platform with Ochsner’s wide-ranging clinical network.
Spectris is a non-invasive neuromodulation system. The system delivers proprietary gamma frequency light and sound stimulation. This evokes EEG-confirmed gamma frequency brain oscillations to treat central nervous system (CNS) diseases. It restores brain electrical activity disrupted in Alzheimer’s.
“Ochsner’s reach across the Gulf South provides a unique opportunity to bring innovative brain health technologies to a broad patient population,” said Christian Howell, CEO of Cognito Therapeutics. “Partnerships like this are essential to ensuring that new therapies can reach patients not just in major academic centers, but across entire healthcare systems that serve both urban and rural communities. Expanding access to patients is critical to generating real-world evidence and ultimately delivering new options for people living with Alzheimer’s disease.”
More about the collaboration between Cognito and Ochsner Health
According to Cognito, the Ochsner Neuroscience Institute serves as a top destination for comprehensive neurological care between Houston and Atlanta. Additionally, Ochsner plans to add a new 132,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art facility, set to open in late 2026. This brings its neurosciences programs under one roof at the Debra H. and Robert J. Patrick Neuroscience Institute at Ochsner Medical Center in New Orleans.
With this expansion ongoing, Ochsner and Cognito plan to develop a Brain Health Index. They hope to have this framework better track cognitive health, disease progression and treatment response from real-world care settings.
They also expect the program to explore pathways to integrate Spectris into clinical care models for patients experiencing cognitive decline and programs serving dual-eligible Medicare and Medicaid populations.
Cognito said they hope to generate clinical and health economics data to better understand the cost-effectiveness of non-invasive neuromodulation therapies and their role within value-based care models.
“This new collaboratory affords us the opportunity to pair emerging neurotechnology with real-world clinical care to better understand how we can slow cognitive decline, improve patients’ lives and open new therapeutic pathways for other neurological diseases in the future,” said Dr. David Houghton, system chair of neurology, Ochsner Health.
