Team
Founders
Hieu Ball, MD
Co-founder · Co-inventor
Bio +
Hieu Ball, MD is a double fellowship-trained orthopedic spine surgeon who has practiced in Northern California for over two decades. He trained at Cornell, Tufts (MD, MPH), and Harvard, with fellowships at Boston Children's Hospital and the Spine Institute at UCLA/St. John's. As clinical faculty he teaches minimally invasive and motion-preserving spine techniques. He has authored multiple award-winning publications and his research in improving safety in minimally invasive spine surgery has gained recognition from the International Society for the Advancement of Spine Surgery.
Jon Block
Co-founder · Co-inventor
Bio +
Jon is a practicing surgical neurophysiologist who has covered orthopedic and neurosurgical procedures at hospitals across the San Francisco Bay Area for over two decades. In 2021 he became the CEO of Americare Neurosurgery International, a nonprofit improving surgical care in developing countries. Jon has volunteered on pediatric medical missions to China, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, and Vietnam. He has authored multiple textbook chapters and award-winning publications that introduced novel methods for improving surgical nerve mapping and monitoring.
Our Story
Our team has spent more than twenty years together in spine surgery, with a history of research focused on reducing nerve injuries. In 2014 we introduced novel methods for protecting nerves in minimally invasive lumbar spine surgery that have since become widely adopted in regular practice. Despite those improvements, the techniques were inherently limited by existing methods of data acquisition, so we set out to design more capable systems. Our emerging platforms integrate precision electrical stimulation, advanced recording techniques, AI, and machine learning. Our goal is to develop the next generation of smart medical instruments, which we expect will have a significant impact on improving patient care across a wide range of medical applications.
Contact
Contact
Contact us for more information.
jblockny@gmail.com
Phone
(678) 977-6666