Verana Health and Nanoscope Therapeutics Announce Collaboration to Accelerate Retinitis Pigmentosa Research
Partnership aims to utilize real-world insights on more than 70,000 de-identified patients with retinitis pigmentosa to advance gene therapy treatments
SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 25, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Verana Health®, a digital health company dedicated to revolutionizing patient care and clinical research through real-world data (RWD), and Nanoscope Therapeutics, a biotech company committed to restoring vision in individuals who are blind or losing vision due to various retinal degenerative diseases, today announced a partnership to accelerate research for retinitis pigmentosa (RP), a rare inherited retinal disease that affects approximately 100,000 people in the U.S.
Through this collaboration, Nanoscope Therapeutics will utilize Verana Health’s Qdata® Retinitis Pigmentosa, which is a research-ready, real-world dataset that can be used to analyze patients with RP and track their clinical outcomes. These outcomes are derived from unstructured and semi-structured fields in electronic health records (EHRs) and include key variables, such as visual acuity and central subfield thickness, which can more accurately classify this patient cohort for research beyond using ICD or SNOMED codes. Such insights will support the development and commercialization of MCO-010, Nanoscope Therapeutics’ optogenetic gene therapy that is designed to restore vision and potentially slow neurodegeneration.
"Access to robust data is essential for advancing our gene therapy programs," said Sulagna Bhattacharya, CEO of Nanoscope Therapeutics. "Verana Health’s Qdata Retinitis Pigmentosa offers valuable insights into disease progression, patient demographics, and treatment outcomes, enabling us to refine our clinical development strategies. This collaboration enhances our ability to create effective and accessible treatments for patients with RP."
Verana Health possesses access to the largest specialty society clinical data registry in all of medicine through its exclusive partnership with the American Academy of Ophthalmology IRIS® Registry (Intelligent Research in Sight). By combining unique, near real-time ophthalmology data, deep clinical expertise, and secure and advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning technology, Verana Health extracts key terms and phrases from unstructured clinical notes to accurately identify the RP patient population.
"We applaud Nanoscope Therapeutics for its commitment to improving therapies for vision-threatening diseases," said Sujay Jadhav, CEO of Verana Health. "Our collaboration underscores how data-driven insights can provide a detailed understanding of patient outcomes and advance the development of new treatments for inherited retinal diseases."
To learn more about Qdata Retinitis Pigmentosa and Verana Health’s Ophthalmology Qdata collection, visit: https://veranahealth.com/qdata/.
To learn more about Nanoscope Therapeutics and its MCO-010 lead program, visit: https://nanostherapeutics.com/pipeline/.
About Verana Health
Verana Health® is a digital health company revolutionizing patient care and clinical research by utilizing physician expertise and artificial intelligence to unlock the true potential of real-world data. With exclusive access to the world’s largest patient data sources in ophthalmology, urology and neurology, Verana Health is powering real-world evidence generation. Clinicians utilize these insights to improve the quality of care and quality of life for patients, and life sciences companies rely on the insights to accelerate the development of new therapies. For more information, visit www.veranahealth.com.
About Nanoscope Therapeutics
Nanoscope Therapeutics is developing gene-agnostic, sight-restoring optogenetic therapies for the millions of patients blinded by retinal degenerative diseases, for which no cure currently exists. Following positive end-of-study results from the RESTORE Phase 2b multicenter, randomized, double-masked, sham-controlled clinical trial for RP (NCT04945772), the company announced its plan to initiate a BLA submission for MCO-010 to treat RP in Q1 2025. The company has completed the Phase 2 STARTLIGHT trial of MCO-010 therapy in Stargardt patients (NCT05417126) and plans to initiate a Phase 3 registrational trial in Q1 2025. MCO-010 has received FDA Fast Track designations and FDA orphan drug designations for both RP and Stargardt. For more information, visit https://nanostherapeutics.com/.
CONTACT: Media Contact: Verana Health MikeWorldWide 847.224.6462 veranahealth@mww.com
