Resonance Health Ltd. advised that it has lodged a provisional patent application in relation to an invention for the detection and assessment of fibrosis in the liver and other organs, utilising non-invasive magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Early detection and assessment of liver fibrosis is essential to managing and reversing liver disease progression. The current gold-standard for assessing the presence and progression of liver fibrosis is by way of liver biopsy, which involves the collection of a tissue sample from the patient using a needle, which is then analysed by a pathologist.

Liver biopsies are not trivial procedures; they are invasive, can give rise to significant side effects (including pain, bleeding, infection, hospitalisation, and even death) and are unavailable for patients with comorbidity factors including blood clotting conditions and infections. Further, liver biopsies are slow and expensive as they require the involvement of multiple medical specialists and facilities, and they may be subject to significant sampling error. Current Non-Invasive Approaches to Liver Fibrosis: Several techniques exist that purport to indicate the presence of liver fibrosis utilising non-invasive or less- invasive procedures than liver biopsy.

These include serum blood tests, ultrasound, and magnetic resonance elastography (MRE) methods and quantitative MRI methods. While these non-invasive methods may provide information as to the presence of liver fibrosis (particularly advanced fibrosis), there are a number of unresolved issues in relation to the accurate and reliable detection of fibrosis using these methods. In addition, the techniques are typically confounded by the presence of factors including liver iron level (or content), subcutaneous fat, ascites, liver fat, liver inflammation and others.

Resonance Health has completed an initial proof-of-concept study of an analysis technique aimed at the identification and assessment of liver fibrosis (Initial Proof of Concept). The Initial Proof of Concept forms the basis of the invention that is the subject of the Provisional Patent Application. The Initial Proof of Concept study, which was conducted on a patient and control group of 30 subjects, indicates a strong capability to predict the absolute presence of liver fibrosis within the study population.

Based on the extremely promising Initial Proof of Concept results Resonance Health is now undertaking an accelerated extended proof-of-concept study with an expanded study population (Extended Proof of Concept). Extended Proof of Concept: The objectives of the Extended Proof of Concept are to confirm the results of the Initial Proof of Concept, to further refine the study predictive models and to further assess the performance of predictive models and their capacity to distinguish between differing fibrosis grades. The duration of the Extended Proof of Concept is estimated to be 6 to 12 months.

The Company is actively engaged with study partners to secure the study subjects required for the study and will update shareholders once the timelines for completion of this phase of the study are determined. Subject to the outcomes of the Extended Proof of Concept, the Company intends to explore collaboration opportunities with large pharmaceutical companies and clinical key opinion leaders (KOLs), who have expressed strong interest in the results of the Initial Proof of Concept and a desire to participate in such a collaboration.