UNMC’s Edward O’Leary, MD, talks with other attendees shorty before presenting his startup, Aprendo Cardiovascular Solutions, to the gathering at the networking event, Idea Pub: Morning Edition, held on June 26, 2025.
OMAHA, Nebraska (June 26, 2025)—UNMC’s Edward O’Leary, MD, an associate professor of cardiovascular medicine, was the featured speaker at yesterday’s Idea Pub: Morning Edition.
Dr. O’Leary, co-founder of Aprendo Cardiovascular Solutions, described his more efficient and effective training methods for a highly specialized procedure, coronary angiography. Coronary angiography involves a medical professional injecting a patient’s blood system with a dye that allows healthcare professionals to use X-ray imagery to clearly see the veins and arteries around the heart.
Using real-time X-ray imaging, angiography shows physicians the best path to guide a wire or thin tube through a patient’s blood vessels. The procedure can be used to diagnose something like coronary artery disease or to install a stent that opens a narrowed or blocked blood vessel.
But learning to navigate the three-dimensional twists and turns of normal human anatomy from a flat, two-dimensional video screen can take a year or more to master. Aprendo’s medical training platform promises to shorten that learning curve while also making access to the training more widely available.
Too often training is limited to physicians when other professionals are also in the room during a procedure, usually an X-ray technician and a nurse.
“Everyone in the room needs to be able to interpret coronary angiography,” Dr. O’Leary said. Enabling everyone with the skill to interpret coronary angiographies would lead to better patient care and outcomes, he said.
Appsky CEO Tyler Reher chats with a guest shortly after his presentation at the June 26, 2025, Idea Pub: Morning Edition.
Aprendo’s solution is a software-based platform built in collaboration with Omaha app developer Appksy. Tyler Reher, Appsky’s CEO, worked on the Aprendo project, and helped build the application so that it could potentially expand to other areas such peripheral arteries or the brain.
Morning Edition is UNeMed’s networking event for university innovators, entrepreneurs and startup community members. Catalyst Omaha co-sponsors the event and provides free tours of the spacious facility.
Morning Editions will continue to be a fixture in the Catalyst’s Forge Event Hall, located on the north end of the building. Guided tours will also continue as an added feature.
The next Morning Edition is planned for Thursday, July 31, 2025, in the Event Hall at 9 a.m.-11 a.m.
