DeForest man's invention advances in Governor's Business Plan Contest

A DeForest man’s company is one of 52 now in the second round of competition in the Wisconsin Governor’s Business Plan Contest.

Erick Przybylski is the founder of Simul8, a medical simulation and innovation company that grew out of his DeForest home in 2019. That was when Przybylski began to develop a simulator that trains physicians on initiating ECMO, a medical procedure that pumps a patient’s blood to a heart-lung machine where oxygen is added and Co2 is removed.

The life-saving procedure — extracorporeal membrane oxygenation — was especially important during the pandemic, Przybylski said, as it can be used to treat severe pneumonia.

Simul8 is the only commercially available simulator in the world that allows physicians to train in such a way.

Przybylski developed the device with a team including Dr. Josh Hermsen, a pediatric cardiac surgeon at UW Health, and Mengizem Tizale, from the UW biomedical engineering department.

Przybylski, who has been a paramedic for nearly 20 years, has a master’s degree in medical and health care simulation. His full-time job is at UW Health as a simulation educator.

He said developing the simulator was a learning process, and it received support from the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation.

“They provided a lot of assistance with getting through the patenting and licensing processes,” he said.

Now the team is providing medical consulting with health systems that lack the resources or training to provide simulation-based education. It appears to be changing the way physicians learn the procedure.

“There are roughly 1,200 hospitals throughout the world that provide this procedure, yet there is no standardized training for this complex intervention,” Przybylski said. “That’s why it was so important to get this out there and keep the cost down for organizations, as well.”

The DeForest Times-Tribune first interviewed Przybylski in 2021. He described the Simul8 device’s use then, noting that those training on it work alongside an instructor. It’s similar to a flight simulator, and is relatively low cost.

Now in the second phase of the Governor’s Business Plan Contest, Przybylski will write an executive summary to be evaluated by the judges in mid March to determine if it moves onto the final phase involving more in-person demonstrations of the product.

“I’m always hopefully pessimistic,” Przybylski said. “I always liked to think this is a good idea, but when this device started being utilized by large university-based hospital systems throughout the country, it was just a reaffirmation that, yes, this really has benefits for patients throughout the world,” he said.

After phase two judging is complete in late March, the 52 entries will be available to accredited investors through the Tech Council Investor Networks, according to the Wisconsin Technology Council which organizes the contest.

The top 12 contestants will then give live presentations at the annual Wisconsin Entrepreneurs Conference in June in Milwaukee, with winners in each category, along with the grand prize winner, to be announced June 6.

Przybylski has plans for other medical training devices, but the prototype development, patent and legal expenses will require significant investment.

“It’s a very costly industry to get into,” he said.