Springbok Analytics announces partnership with Friends of FSH Research

Through its ongoing work with the international FSHD community, Springbok is supporting leading edge research and drug development while at the same time providing new data to patients and their providers

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va., Oct. 18, 2023 /PRNewswire/ - Springbok Analytics (www.springbokanalytics.com) announced today a new partnership with Friends of FSH Research (www.fshfriends.org), a Seattle-based organization that is positively impacting the lives of those affected by facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD) through the financial support of novel FSHD research. Friends of FSH Research ("Friends") is fully committed to transparent, reproducible, and transformative science that will inspire hope for people living with FSHD. The initial funded project will use Springbok's AI technology to analyze and combine previously collected longitudinal MRI datasets from four sites: Seattle Children's/University of Washington, University of Kansas Medical Center, Rochester Medical Center, and Kennedy Krieger Institute (Johns Hopkins). The overall aim is to better characterize individual muscle progression and develop optimized statistical methods so that patient-specific risk maps and individual muscle MRI biomarkers can be optimally used as therapeutic endpoints.

FSHD is a highly complex and progressive muscle wasting disease which causes weakening and loss of skeletal muscle in adults and children. This muscle loss often robs patients of the ability to walk, talk, smile, blink or even eat independently. Through its ongoing partnerships with the international FSHD community, Springbok is supporting leading edge research and drug development while providing new data to patients and their providers, helping them to better understand the impact of the disease at a deeper muscular level. The goal is to enhance targeted therapy programs and improve patient quality of life through more informed disease management plans, aligning closely with Springbok's overarching mission to improve the health of millions around the world.

"We started Friends 20 years ago with the singular mission of stimulating and funding FSHD research in order to find a treatment or a cure. Our dream is that one day when FSHD is diagnosed, the next words said are 'there is a cure,'" said Terry Colella, President of Friends. "Funding initiatives that combine Springbok's capabilities with the great work being done by scientists, research and other experts around the world is a significant step toward this goal."

"The impact of their investment on the field cannot be understated. Sometimes ideas present themselves that have the potential to be transformative, but they are out of step with the often-long arc of government funding. Friends has been our hometown force helping to move research forward as fast as possible," said Dr. Seth Friedman, a researcher with Seattle Children's Hospital and imaging scientist overseeing MRI work associated with the Seattle-based NIH Wellstone project, led by Drs. Jeff Chamberlain and Stephen Tapscott, now starting its third five-year funding cycle.

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has been identified as the most precise method for monitoring the progression of FSHD, owing to visible changes in the muscles, including fat infiltration, volume changes, and enhanced fluid signal suggested to be edema or inflammation. Since the pattern of muscles that are affected by FSHD varies by patient, and because individual muscles have measurable spatial features of change, a personalized approach that evaluates all individual musculature is critical.

"We are both honored and highly motivated to support the global FSHD community and are encouraged by how our technology can provide a more complete picture of muscle health, disease progression, and hoped for therapeutic response," said Springbok CEO and Co-Founder Scott Magargee. "Partnering with researchers like Dr. Friedman, and organizations like Friends, we believe we are getting much closer to the limit of biomarker precision and the ability to optimally affirm treatment success for a disease like FSHD."

Springbok's personalized MSK visualizations give patients, doctors, and researchers a better understanding of the relationship between healthy, developed muscles and those with disease-specific fat infiltration. Its 3D analysis can extract several measures related to spatial patterning, expressed along the muscle orientation or in a pixel-by-pixel analysis of how fat is distributed or changing over-time, unlocking new insights into the mechanisms of how healthy muscle is affected by FSHD.

Springbok Analytics reveals never-before-seen data to improve health, performance, treatment monitoring and MSK function. To learn more, please visit www.springbokanalytics.com.

Springbok's technology transforms standard, 2D magnetic resonance image (MRI) data into personalized 3D muscle visualizations for athletic, performance and health applications. Springbok has created a new way to view and quantify muscle volume, quality and asymmetries for precision health insights and performance optimization. To learn more, please visit: www.springbokanalytics.com.

Friends is an all-volunteer run non-profit organization whose mission is to stimulate and support FSH Research. Founded in 2004, Friends has helped lead the way by funding novel FSH research and encourage new research interest in this field. Friends' expert Scientific Advisory Board carefully selects project proposals which will move FSH research toward the development of an effective therapy or cure. To learn more, please visit: www.fshfriends.org.

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SOURCE Springbok Analytics