We needed to provide some home solutions to some
of the devices and gadgets that we used.
This led to the establishment of SLP, Sleep Laboratory Products,
that specialized in building sensors for the sleep laboratory.
This company is now, again, it's a Technion company,
which means 50% owned by the company and 50% by me and my partners at the time.
And we are now selling to the sleep market a variety of sensors, and
our newest product is the sleep strip, which is like a mustache
that is taped under the nostrils in order to record breathing.
I don't remember the date, but
it was the late 70s that we started this commercial activity.
This was my first commercial activity.
The second one was, I came to the Technion and I said, look, I am seeing patients.
We are the only ones in Israel who can provide some consultation about sleep.
Let me open a clinic.
This will be the Technion Sleep Disorder Center.
I have physician, so I'm ready to be the clinical director, since I'm not an MD,
but they rely on me for the diagnostic procedure.
And we started to see patients on a routine basis.
Then we opened a laboratory or a clinic in Tel Aviv, and
then we opened a clinic in Jerusalem, and we open a clinic in Holon.
Now, we have three clinics in Haifa, in the Rambam Hospital,
in Wolfson Hospital in Holon, and in Hillel Yaffe in Hadera.
I would estimate that up to now, some 200,000 people
spend at least one night in the Technion Sleep Disorder Center.
And this was one of the first in Israel, and
it became a model for what we did in the US later on.
One of my areas of research was sleep apnea syndrome.
Sleep apnea syndrome is a disease or
a syndrome that is characterized by breathing arrests during sleep.
The patient goes to sleep.
The moment he falls asleep, or she, stop breathing.
And this can happen recurrently throughout the night.
Severe patients have at least once per minute an apnea or a breathing arrest.
These patients are not aware of their breathing disorder.
They come to the clinician complaining about fatigue,
a tendency to fall asleep during the day, snoring.
I would say, very, very disturbing and loud snoring.
Many of them suffer from hypertension.
And at that time, one of my postdocs, Dr and
me started to look into the issue of hypertension and sleep apnea.
And it was obvious to us that blood pressure increased during sleep.
When we have the apnea, once you resume breathing,
there is a sharp increase in blood pressure.
The problem is that to measure blood pressure continuously during sleep,
you have to go into the arteries with a very invasive measurement,
which is very risky.
So we decided to develop a methodology or a device that will allow us to
measure blood pressure continuously during sleep, and from the finger.
A device sensor that is mounted on the finger and
impose on the finger a uniform pressure that
allow us to measure the changes in blood flow
in the finger in a very, very sensitive way.
And we decided to look for
investment to build a blood pressure monitor based on this device.
One day I got a telephone call from somebody I didn't know.
His name was who was an entrepreneur, a physicist,