Cognito Therapeutics Inc. has revealed that its lead product has received breakthrough device designation from the U.S. FDA for the treatment of cognitive and functional symptoms associated with Alzheimer’s disease. The offering is a noninvasive neurostimulation device using gamma frequency technology and is the initial candidate in the company’s pipeline of digital therapeutics for neurodegenerative diseases and other chronic indications.

The U.S. FDA has issued an action plan for regulation of artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI, ML), which includes issuance of a draft guidance for change control for adaptive algorithms. There is no guarantee a final guidance will emerge before 2022, however, leaving developers with another year – perhaps longer – of uncertainty as to how to handle change control for their algorithms.

Helix Opco LLC, a company specializing in population genomics, has received de novo marketing authorization from the U.S. FDA for its whole exome sequencing platform, which covers roughly 20,000 genes. The San Mateo, Calif.-based company also picked up 510(k) clearance from the FDA for the first test to run on the Helix Laboratory Platform, a genetic health risk application for late-onset Alzheimer’s disease. That test has been cleared for over-the-counter use in conjunction with the Helix Laboratory Platform.

Cognitoss, a resorbable bone graft in development by Locate Bio Ltd., received U.S. FDA breakthrough device designation for treating chronic osteomyelitis, a progressive, inflammatory bone infection. The graft uses a new class of composite collagen product combined with a dual-phasic release of antibiotics to prevent reinfection.

TORONTO – Scan the literature on mental health technologies, and you’ll find treatment apps for everything from depression to addiction. What you won’t find, said Claude Hariton, vice president and chief scientific officer at Quebec City-based Diamentis Inc., are tools to diagnose mental diseases. It’s a gap the company hopes to fill with Retinal Signal Processing and Analysis (RSPA), a tool just accepted into the U.S. FDA’s breakthrough devices program that diagnoses mental diseases from retinal signals in the eye.

Ultromics Ltd. received U.S. FDA 510(k) clearance for its artificial intelligence-driven decision support tool for the diagnosis of coronary artery disease (CAD). Used in conjunction with a clinician's assessment, Echogo Pro's algorithms improve disease prediction and support more accurate diagnosis. Echogo Pro is a stress-Echo module in the Oxford, U.K.-based company's Echogo suite for CAD diagnosis.

Computer system validation (CSV) has been the source of considerable drag on device makers’ efforts to realize value derived from investments in the company’s technology base, but this long-standing issue is finally drawing some much-needed attention.