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It has been a little over a year and a half since the SimpleShot, an invention of Kim Bertron, Brian Boothe, and Wiley Horton received the award for first runner-up on The History Channels Modern Marvels, Invent Now Challenge!

The event also awarded the trio $10,000 for the continuation of their efforts.

The idea came shortly after Kim Bertron’s daughter, who has Type 1 diabetes, suffered from a severe hypoglycemic episode. While panicking to assist her unconscious daughter, Bertron broke the tiny needle on the vial of glucagon. Violent seizures can be the result of the blood glucose dropping to low levels within the person. Severe hypoglycemia occurs most often in people with type 1 diabetes; it is one of the most common types of hypoglycemia seen in emergency departments and hospitals. Glucagon is normally produced by the pancreas. When the glucose level in the blood is low, glucagon secretion is released from the islet A cell. Thus it has the opposite effects of insulin, which instructs the body’s cells to take in glucose from the blood in times of satiation. 

Bertron did manage to settle down enough to retrieve the spare kit she had in the car and administer the drug. The incident however, had a powerful motivating effect, “there must be a better way” with plans of attending college only being a few years away for her daughter. She realized that not many, if any of her daughters peers would be able to react at the drop of a dime to administer the drug which required multiple steps. She would later find that her experiences and concerns were shared among others with loved ones suffering from Type 1 diabetes. Her quest to find a more efficient way that was both simple and quick led her to mechanical engineer Brian Boothe who was a graduate student at the time. Patent attorney and fellow engineer Wiley Horton was a mutual friend of both individuals and made the initial introduction between the two. 

Boothe is a designer and played an important role in helping Bertron establish a working prototype from her primitive design sketches and ideas of how the SimpleShot could work. Horton on the other hand is a patent attorney who was able to give them valuable legal knowledge. 

Boothe originally brought several different designs to the table when the group met. The SimpleShot is actually very simple in concept as it is a single syringe with two sealed chambers. The lower chamber of the syringe stores the powder form glucagon, while the upper chamber stores the diluting solution. The mixture is instantly mixed once the seal between the two chambers is broken by pushing the plunger of the syringe. The concept of the syringe makes it easy for anyone to administer the drug in an emergency situation. The powdered form of glucagons is required as it allows for a longer shelf life than liquid would.

The partnership would not have formed if Boothe had not decided to return to school to earn his master’s degree in mechanical engineering after starting a career in finance. The creation of the SimpleShot also led to the creation of his own company Corsair, EDA, Inc. (www.corsair-eda.com), Boothe’s creative outlet that has lead to helping other inventors come up with products such as the ClickBrick and Gpik to name a few. 

Being impressed by the prototype that Boothe produced, Bertron decided to submit the syringe to Modern Marvels Invent Now Challenge. The SimpleShot was chosen as a top 25 semi-finalists out of a field of over 2,500 inventions. It would eventually go on to become the first runner-up on the show.

A company named Vetter from Germany creates a similar product to the SimpleShot but there is nothing on the market in the United States. Currently the trio holds the patent and intellectual property to the dual chamber syringe, so anything that uses the same method would be an infringement in the U.S. 

Even though the SimpleShot did well on Modern Marvels, it is still in the early development stages. Boothe mentioned that, “In some aspect a product never leaves the development stage as you are always looking for ways to improve its use for the consumer.”

As with any new medical device the SimpleShot must go through the long and grueling process of being approved by the FDA. They have however, started evaluating some interest of using the syringe for veterinary practice as a first step, as the regulations and standards would allow for production.

Meetings for venture capital have been productive over the past month. It is an option that the group has agreed would be necessary for the future well being of the SimpleShot. The airtime from the Modern Marvels Invent Now Challenge has definitely helped increase the demand for their product. The consumer pushing the manufacturing of product is still a very feasible option. The biggest concern for large volume manufacturing is making the syringe applicable to more than just those with diabetes. An example of another large scale application for the SimpleShot could be found in efforts underway to increase vaccinations for individuals in developing countries.

The SimpleShot is not yet available for medical use at the moment. The group is working hard to continue developing the product. Even though it is a must have for those with diabetes, the trio must continue to try and diversify the product to prove that it will have financial stability in the medical field for investors. One aspect that is often overlooked in instances like the SimpleShot (a product that seems like common sense to produce) is the cost of manufacturing against the retail value it will have.

The future does look bright but only time will tell how successful the SimpleShot will become. The potential is definitely there!

-Interviewed by Bryan Young