Episode 10: Mike Senerchia & The Picc Pouch – Transforming Home Infusion Therapy

In Episode 10 of the Inventor Spotlight Podcast, Samantha St. Raymond speaks with Mike Senerchia, the creator of the Picc Pouch, an innovative solution for individuals undergoing home infusion therapy. This hands-free, safe, and convenient product addresses a significant need in the medical community, inspired by Mike’s personal journey with infusion therapy.

With three design patents secured and a utility patent in progress, the Picc Pouch is set to make waves in the healthcare industry. Mike dives into the challenges and triumphs of bringing this life-changing product to market, sharing insights into the patenting process, his motivations, and the potential impact of his invention. Visit the Picc Pouch website: https://piccpouch.com/

Watch the episode here: https://youtu.be/wwP47ctkVTk

---------------------------------
To learn more about the Inventor Smart Community App, watch the video here: https://youtu.be/PxQvjjBq1S0

Inventor Smart Community App: The Ultimate Inventor's Community! Imagine a place where your invention ideas are celebrated, nurtured, and propelled forward. Welcome to Inventor Smart, where you'll connect with a passionate community of creators who understand your journey and help you bring your ideas to life!

Here's how Inventor Smart Community App will inspire you:

*Connect and Collaborate: Join lively group chats and forums to brainstorm with fellow inventors, share your progress, and overcome obstacles together.

*Tap into a Wealth of Knowledge: Get expert advice on patents, licensing, manufacturing, marketing, and retail distribution – all from experienced inventors who've been there.

*Spark Your Inspiration: Attend exciting online and in-person events designed to ignite your creativity and connect you with fellow innovators. Join live streams with industry leaders and the National Inventor Club, participate in book club meetings and Q&A sessions, or meet face-to-face at Meet and Greets.

*Gain Recognition: Showcase your invention to the community and gain valuable exposure. Pitch your ideas to explore potential partnerships. Be featured in our "Inventor in the Spotlight" series, where we share your inspiring journey with the community.

*Stay in the Know: Receive real-time notifications and announcements to keep you informed and inspired. Download Inventor Smart today and experience the power of a supportive community!


Download the Inventor Smart Community app today:
iOS in the Apple app store: 
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/inventor-smart-community/id6448789752
and Andriod in Google Play store: https://inventorsmartplay.com
Also on the web app.inventorsmart.com.


Have a great invention idea? Do you want to know if your idea will make you money? If you're just getting started, need help with product development, engineering, prototyping, finding a product licensing agent or with bringing your invention idea to reality manufacturing overseas or in the USA, schedule a call with Brian Fried, The Inventor Coach @ https://brianfried.com 

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:22):
Hi, how are you?

Speaker 2 (00:24):
Hi?

Speaker 3 (00:25):
Good morning, Welcome to episode ten of our Inventor Podcast,
so brought to you from the Inventor Smart community and
of course the National Inventor Club.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
So, Mike, I'm going to try and pronounce your.

Speaker 3 (00:40):
Name sener Chia, right, perfect, Michael Senerchia.

Speaker 1 (00:45):
I did it. Congrats to me.

Speaker 3 (00:47):
Anyway, we're here talking to inventors about their products, what
inspired them, what got them here, And I'm very excited
that you're with us today for episode ten. We've got
obviously nine behind us, so I'm happy to have you here.

Speaker 1 (01:03):
Mike. I'm going to give you a second.

Speaker 3 (01:04):
Just introduce yourself, tell us about your product, what you
have going on, and.

Speaker 2 (01:09):
Please Okay, I'm Mike and my product is called pick Pouch.
And before I get into explaining the product itself, let
me tell you about my story and why and how
it came about. So several years ago. It was actually
on my birthday. I woke up and they had extreme
pain in my left foot. I looked down and my

(01:31):
foot was the size of a football. It was. It
hurt tremendously. So I went to two different orthopedic surgeons
and they couldn't figure out what was wrong with me.
As a matter of fact, one of them, she called
me a conundrum. So she said, go to a rheumatologist
and see what they could do. So a rheumatologist put
me on a very strong prednizone regiment that got my

(01:55):
foot back down to normal size. Went to another orthopedic
surgeon and he said, I have osteomi light is on
my left foot, which is a very bad infection, and
actually had a necrotic bone that had to be taken
out surgically. So what happens is he said, you need
a pickline because the medicine I have to give you

(02:15):
to kill the the infection is too strong for your
stomach to handle. So pickline, no idea what he's talking about.
So I go to a vascular surgeon and he puts
an IV line in my arm. It goes through my
chest and deposits into a valve in my heart. So,
now this is what it looks like. I have a

(02:36):
prop it's just so you can get an idea. So
now I have a PICK IV line coming out of
my arm. Now PICK is PI C C and that
stands for a peripherally inserted central catheter. So they put
the IV line in and now you put your medicine

(02:57):
through the port here. So now this is the medicine.
It's a self pressorized medicine ball. It's done at the
lab and they put the medicine in and they had
it precisely dispensed to the amount that they wanted to
go during your treatment. So I was prescribed two different medicines.

(03:19):
One took ninety minutes to empty and I had to
do that three times a day. The other one took
twenty minutes to empty and I had to do that
twice a day. So now, not being a type to
sit around for four hours, I had to come up
with an idea. So my first session with my ninety

(03:41):
medicine ball, I took my racketball glove. I played a
lot of racketball. I took my racketball glove. I cut
the fingers off. I took a sponge that had a
scouring pad on it. Took out the sponge, sod the
pouch to the back of my racketball glove, and now

(04:03):
pick pals is worn. So now I put this on
my hand, I plug in my port and go about
my work. So this is my first prototype. So when
you do interesting yet.

Speaker 3 (04:19):
Genius, I'm in just I'm blown away. I'm continue, please, brilliant.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
This is this is the first prototype. So the vasculo surgeon,
I put it on my arm. I went back to
him a week later and I says, look, how about
this idea? And he goes him and his staff said,
you have to get this done. I need this for
every one of my patients because you're going to make
their life so much better. So with home this is
home infusion therapy. It's been around for over ten years.

(04:49):
They've been progressing, advancing, they've increased the different varieties of
treatments that they're dealing with. Cancer is a very big
thing that they're doing with home infusion therapy now. So
so my treatment was eight weeks and I had both
medicines for cancer. Sometimes your treatment could be six months,
could be nine months, could be fourteen months or more.

(05:11):
So you have the IV line in your arm all
that time, and you have to administer your drugs. But
with cancer, because there's such a controlled substance, it flows
very very very slowly. So MINDU took ninety minutes for
cancer treatment could take four hours. These hours, now you're tied.

(05:32):
This is an empty medicine ball. Now you're tied to
the medicine ball with the line. They always give you
three feet excess line. Now you're plugging your port and
now you're stuck. Now what this is the problem. So,

(05:54):
like I said, it doesn't have to be here, It
doesn't have to be anywhere. You can stick it in
your pocket, but that's not going to alleviate the three
feet of excess line, which is dangerous because if it
gets caught, it could yank out of your arm if
it crimps. Now you're stopping the flow of your therapy.
So pick pouch. Let me show you this is how

(06:16):
pick pouch works. You take your ball, put it in
the pouch, You take your plug, patch it to your port,
put it on your wrist. There's a flow here, open

(06:39):
the floe, and now you're done. Pick pouch is here.
Your hands free, You do whatever you want to do.
The access line isn't hanging three feet It's not going
get caught up on my desk chair. It's not going
to get stuck in bed. And I got to tell
you this little story. I was doing research because I
needed to learn everything i could about home infusion therapy
and client therapy. Big medical institutions like Mayo Clinic to

(07:04):
Cleveland Institute, they put videos out to show you how
to take care of your pickline because when you're not
using your pickline, there's several companies out there that have
what's called a pickline cover. So pickline cover just kind
of sits in your arm. You put the line inside there,
so now you're protected. So now the line's not going

(07:28):
to get caught. You keep it clean, everything is fine.
There's nothing proprietary about this. There's tons of companies selling
pickline covers. But in the video watching from whichever institution
it was, there's someone had to keep the clean, how
to keep it safe, and they show it was animated.
They show a little girl going to bed and she
had cancer treatment which could last, like I said, six

(07:49):
hours or more. They tell her take your medicine ball,
place it on the nightstand and go to sleep and
try not to get tangled up wine. Right, I'm like, okay,
does not anybody not see the problem there? So if

(08:10):
you have pick pouch, it's on your arm, the ball
is here, your line is here. You can wear you
can just wear a long sleeve shirt over it, and
you go to sleep. You're fine. There's no tangling, there's
no problems. You're not going to you're not going to
interfere with the flow because it comes like this, and
you leave it like this. Like I said, the flow
is determined that the lead. So the lead fills it

(08:31):
with your medicine and the flow is determined there, so
they know how to do the controlled flow of your medicine.
So everything is fine. So you're safe and comfortable.

Speaker 1 (08:40):
So I've got a couple of questions. So you're saying.

Speaker 3 (08:43):
That the port line, you've made it a little bit smaller,
so it kind of tucks into the glove.

Speaker 1 (08:52):
So what I said a few minutes ago, right, So
you just leave it like that as a standard is
you always.

Speaker 2 (09:00):
Get these things are made out of the United States,
like Cyprus are.

Speaker 1 (09:03):
Somewhere, okay.

Speaker 2 (09:05):
The big companies import the balls empty and then they
go to the labs and the labs kill them.

Speaker 1 (09:10):
Got it.

Speaker 2 (09:11):
You get it like this, You plug it in because
this is what's hanging out of your arm. You have
to pick out of the therapy. This hangs out of
your arm.

Speaker 1 (09:18):
Got it?

Speaker 2 (09:19):
So, like I said, this is in your arm. Could
be twelve.

Speaker 1 (09:22):
Months or more of course, yes, you have a nurse.

Speaker 2 (09:24):
That checks it every week. They clean it, they flush it,
they make sure the bandages, they change it. They do
everything they can and keep everything clean. Of course, even
when you take a shower. I had to wraps so
ran wrap around my arm because you can't get soapy
water or anything in the site.

Speaker 3 (09:40):
Obviously, right during the time that you are using it,
there's a lot of modifications that you need to make.
I love this product, and the whole time you've been
describing it, in my mind, I keep thinking children, children, children, obviously, Yeah,
I mean it's one thing to be an adult and
be contained. You know, that's hard enough, but a child,

(10:01):
this is brilliant.

Speaker 2 (10:03):
So yeah, that's exactly right. Because a friend of mine,
he was speaking with the nurse from a pediatric cancer hospital.
He's telling her about pick Pouch, and he says to me,
she was screaming on the phone. Give me this product,
because you're going to change these kids' lives, because these
kids can do what they want to do while they're
getting their treatment and they're not subjected to sitting in

(10:26):
a chair or doing nothing to screams. He was getting
this product. You're going to change these kids' lives.

Speaker 3 (10:32):
And the pouch part that that ball type thing goes
and that's like it looks like it's a mesh material.

Speaker 1 (10:38):
Is that correct? Like it's breathable.

Speaker 2 (10:40):
Yeah, designed it so you can see the flow, so
you can see, Okay walks off like this. Sure again,
mine took ninety minutes.

Speaker 3 (10:49):
Sure, I wanted to see how you want to see inside,
so then.

Speaker 2 (10:53):
You know when it's done, you'll see. Now you have
a ball that's in here. You see it's finished. So
now you know it's time to unplug, and you don't,
I mean, you know by the time, but you also
can see. So of course I have it a visual
so I can see it dispensing. So I thought that
was important for me. I didn't want it to be
you know, I don't want you not to be able

(11:15):
to see it.

Speaker 3 (11:15):
Yeah again, when i'm you know again what I love
about inventors and innovation and this community in particular, as
we were all together. You know, we're finding these personal
problems and we're creating solutions for the masses. You know,
and this is the genius behind it. You're personal. All
of a sudden, you wake up, there's something wrong with

(11:37):
your foot. You don't know what's wrong, and you know,
one thing leads to another and here we are. So
how long have you been working on on a pick pouch?

Speaker 2 (11:49):
I had my first surgery in twenty nineteen. Okay, so
I started with that. I didn't even know when I made.
When I made this for myself, I didn't sure think
it was going to be a product I was going
to work on. I got my own comfort. I made
it for myself and that was it. I even had

(12:11):
extra medicine balls left over after my therapy that I
threw in the garbage because it wasn't the thought of
my head yet. So I went to the vascular surgeon
and he looked at it, and he goes, get this done.
He goes, I need every one of my patients. So
then it was okay, now what do I do?

Speaker 1 (12:29):
So then I'm going to jump it again. I have
a question.

Speaker 3 (12:31):
Were you previously an adventure or is this your background
in any way?

Speaker 1 (12:35):
Or is this just again by happens since.

Speaker 2 (12:38):
I am one of those creative mind freaks that find
simple solutions to everything.

Speaker 3 (12:45):
Hey, we identify with those simple mind freaks over here?
You just are you kidding me?

Speaker 2 (12:53):
I wrote a little motivational book. And in the book
I put down, I have a term called I Michaelize
Everything so great?

Speaker 1 (13:04):
I love that. And what's the name of that book?
And where can we get it?

Speaker 2 (13:08):
I keeve Brian a copy or two?

Speaker 3 (13:09):
Okay, real, we add that to the book club one night,
so maybe we'll save it for the book club that sometimes.

Speaker 2 (13:16):
It's a little motivational book I wrote. I was in
a gym. I was re evaluating my own life and
everything I wanted to be and I wasn't and I
have can I improve? So I wrote the little book.
I have one hundred and ten positive quotes in it
that I wrote, and it basically just says, are you
where you want to be? Well? What can I do

(13:37):
to improve myself? And plant seeds to just keep you
motivated and keep you positive?

Speaker 1 (13:41):
Yes, we all need that.

Speaker 3 (13:43):
It's a great daily reminders, motivationals, all of it. Absolutely,
especially in the field that we've tapped ourselves into. You know,
you better handle rejection, you better, you better know how
to hear a lot of notes and keep going and
keep going and keep going.

Speaker 1 (13:58):
So where we at today?

Speaker 3 (13:59):
How many patents are you holding on this amazing product?

Speaker 2 (14:03):
I have three design patents awarded to me. Okay, I'm
actually waiting for the third if they send the third paperwork.
I got the paperwork for the first two. I don't
know if I'm not doing everything electronic. My patent agents said,
I'm not sure if you need to get the paper
or they can send you an email. But I have
three design patents and I'm waiting on the utility patent
to be approved. That agent has been dealing with this

(14:27):
examiner for three years now, and he completely rewrote the
first patent, utility pattern. It's thirty two pages of brilliant
information for this little piece of material. Thirty two pages
of brilliance.

Speaker 1 (14:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (14:43):
Well, he feels ninety nine percent sure we're getting the
utility patent along of course having the design patents. So
I had the three already. I'm waiting for the utility
And what I did was I wrote a little instruction
guide that shows you to three. I have to show
you a different styles too. I have three different styles.
So I have the wrist that goes on your wrist,

(15:06):
and I made what I call is the glove pat
the glove pouch because I was a little concerned with
senior citizens or people that might not like to have
something on their wrist all day, if their skin can't
handle the tightness, or if their integrity of the skin,
you know, isn't up to par. The glove is looser,

(15:26):
but it won't fall off because it's a glove. Sure,
So I have the glove, I have the risk, and
I also have one it's just an elastic band and
a velcro band. So those are the three styles. I
tried to come up with what I thought was going
to be the only way you can do this. I
kind of want to just make this or make this,

(15:47):
and then somebody's going to say, oh, I have the glove.
I did this. I created every solution to holding a
patch to your wrist that I could think of. So
these three three styles of what I did. And then
I copyrighted an instruction guide, and I have the instruction guide.
It's only like four or five pages, but it tells
you how to use each one. And I did that

(16:07):
to protect my method abuse. So in case somebody somehow
comes up with a way of doing a pick palch
that's different from my patents, they're infringing on my method abuse. Okay,
you're write it. I'm protected. Got it pretty well protected
with my product, so I'm in good shake with that.

Speaker 1 (16:27):
Okay, So what are your plans moving forward?

Speaker 3 (16:30):
Are you planning on manufacturing and distributing yourself? Are you
looking for licensing opportunities? What direction are you kind of?
You know sometimes as inventors, you know, we plan to
see what comes first, or what are you thinking about?

Speaker 2 (16:45):
I would love to just license it to a company,
let them take the ball and let them run with it.
I mean, home fusion industry is a huge market. They're
doing thirty billion dollars a year. Did my business plan?
Did the research? This is over three years ago. This
is over two hundred and fifty thousand pick lines inserted

(17:07):
monthly just in the United States, of course. So it's
a good market and my goal because when I went
to the vascular surgeon and I showed him my prototype,
he goes to the nurse, go get me the kit
I get from Cook Medical. So she comes out with
a kit and the kid has everything. The doctor needs
to put the iving in my arm and get me

(17:29):
set up for pick confusion therapy. And he says to me,
this should be in my kit.

Speaker 1 (17:34):
Included in the kit.

Speaker 2 (17:36):
Yes, I do this and put this in somebody's arm.
They should take one of these and go home with
it because this is going to change their lives.

Speaker 3 (17:43):
Or if they can't, if it's not included in the kit,
they should be able to go down to their local
drug store and there it is in the retail space
and pick it up.

Speaker 2 (17:51):
I would love to license it, but I don't know.
I have no sales yet, I have no backbone. I
have nothing to say to a company. It's a tremendous product. Look,
thousands of people are using it, so I'm probably gonna
have to go to route where I have to manufacture
a few hundred, go to a few hospitals, go to
some doctors, get it out there and see what kind

(18:12):
of reaction I get. And I can say, look, I
had it. These are people that are using it. I'm
getting a great response, So you know, get involved with
this piece.

Speaker 3 (18:22):
Yeah, there's one thing I think about product development as
an inventor that we can all be sure of that
everybody can have an opinion on what the best route
to go is.

Speaker 1 (18:32):
Right.

Speaker 3 (18:32):
I could sit here and stay to you. Yeah, man, manufacturer,
a thousand of those hit the streets.

Speaker 1 (18:36):
Go go go.

Speaker 3 (18:37):
But I could also say you know, you need to
find the right licensing in the medical industry that will
take this and just run with it, and you can
sit back and see how that contract would develop. So
I'm definitely not one to push you in one direction
or the other, but I can tell you that just intuitively,
you know, I think you've got something here, and really

(19:00):
impressed and really proud of you. And I know it
takes a lot of work and a lot of time,
and sorry, you had to go through some agony and
some pain to kind of to figure out something that
could really aid and help others along the way. I'm
one of those man. I love how the universe works
and one thing can always just lead to another. We
don't understand why or how it happens. You know, this

(19:22):
inventor smart community, it's I love it so much that
we have so many different inventors from all different areas,
different parts of the world, the States, and everybody comes
with a really amazing personal story.

Speaker 1 (19:35):
Of their why, how, when, what, And.

Speaker 3 (19:39):
It's just it's motivational, it's inspirational, and I think it
connects us all in a way.

Speaker 1 (19:45):
So how long or not how long?

Speaker 3 (19:47):
But how do you feel about the Inventor Smart Community
and the National Inventor Club and being a member with us.

Speaker 1 (19:54):
How's that been working for you.

Speaker 2 (19:56):
I'm kind of brand new, so I really haven't myself
with anything at I've had several conversations with Brian, and
you know, we attempted to get some put some feelers
out there to some of the big companies. But you
know yourself, this is a brutal, brutal process. Just get lucky.

(20:19):
You know, some people do just get lucky. They come
out with a product, somebody jumps on and says, hey, great,
you know, but this is a brutal process. It's it's
been a roller coaster ride. It's been a lot of money,
it's been a lot of emotional pain. It's been a
lot of ups and downs. But you know, you got
to stay positive. And I know it's a good product.
I know it's going to change millions lives. I know
it's going to be good for kids, adults, whatever. So

(20:41):
I know it's going to be it. I know God
gave me this infection for a reason because he knows
on this creative character. So he knew I'd create this
and help millions of people. So I mean, I know
it's going to be big. I even trademarked a phrase,
passion through Pain, so I own the words passion through

(21:02):
Pain because I know this is going to be so big.
That's going to be my charity organization that I can
give back, So come from Passion through Pain, which is
also part of the name of my book, my motivational
book Listen.

Speaker 1 (21:15):
I mean, I think that the you know, the true
grit Listen. I've called myself a creative idiot.

Speaker 3 (21:21):
You know, at times, you know, you just you can't
stop and you don't know why or when the next one.

Speaker 1 (21:27):
But it's the true grit of you know. Yeah, you
can reach.

Speaker 3 (21:30):
Out to a few companies and get a lot of
nos and doors closed. That does not mean that you
don't have a valuable product for the market. I just
you know, I'm one of those too. I'm like, now
I'll go to the next one, to the next, to
the next, And I think every success story has that.
But again with this mentor smart community, and part of
our purpose here is to highlight inventors like yourselves, like yourself,

(21:54):
and to bring attention and to support you and to
you know, just be together and to recognize one another
of Yeah, it takes a long time, it takes a
lot of money, and there's there's a lot to go through.

Speaker 1 (22:07):
But at the end, you know, what if, what if
just by.

Speaker 2 (22:11):
Doing research through this whole process. The normal time it
takes to get your product from idea to contract is
about seven years. Easy's statistic show five to seven years. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (22:26):
So a buddy of mine, we have a saying we're
fifteen years into a five year stretch.

Speaker 2 (22:32):
So you know, yeah, you know, this guy's an overnight success.
They don't realize. You know, he's been going through the
curve and going through the trenches fifteen years. You know, Oh,
you're just an overnight success. No, it doesn't work that way,
you right, You got to stay positive, got to stay
with it. You can't give up.

Speaker 3 (22:54):
We can cually say this all day long. I mean,
if it was easy, everyone would be doing it. And
there's never no such thing as an overnight success, sol
though it may appear to be sometimes.

Speaker 2 (23:04):
Yeah, So it's just going to take some time. It's
going to you know, I'm going to continue working on it.
I am well protected. I think between the three design patents,
the utility patent, the Copyrighted Instruction Guide to protect method abuse.
I'm pretty well protected. So all I got to do
now is get it out there so people can see it,
get it into the right hands. Let somebody with a

(23:25):
little bit of insights say, you know what this is
going to work, Let's do it. And then that's it.
I'm done. I can go onto my next one, and
then the next one, and then the next one. So
it's going to be a never ending process. If there's
more and more products, well.

Speaker 1 (23:39):
I think too.

Speaker 3 (23:40):
You know, once the consumer has it, you know, if
you go that route where you manufacture a few hundred
of them, you're going to get so much feedback just
from that. You know, some some proponents of it may
change because the consumer will always let us know. But
clearly what you have is definitely solving a problem for
you know, homopathic therapies that need to happen in your home.

(24:04):
And like you said, it's a growing industry. So I'm
going to be so excited to see where this sends
up for you. I'm really happy that you're a part
of our community, and stay with us, stay in the app.
You know, if anybody out there wants to join us,
you know, we're inventor smart community and I'm sorry.

Speaker 2 (24:22):
I can send you some of the booklets. I can
if you text me an address, I'll send you some
of the booklets you can see and then you can
see if it's it could be part of the book club.

Speaker 1 (24:32):
Oh yeah, we would absolutely take a look at that
for sure. All right, Michael, I think this is a
wrap today.

Speaker 3 (24:37):
Thank you so much for joining us and sharing your
product and this ingenious idea. Yeah, and I know that
we're going to speak again and we'll keep updating, and
you and I can talk outside of this video today.
And I've got an idea for you that i wanted
to share with you, but we'll get to that off camera.
In that I would be have a very happy, successful Monday.

(24:58):
And we'll see in the Inventor Smart Community.

Speaker 1 (25:02):
We'll see you in our meetings.

Speaker 3 (25:03):
Our next one is obviously October twenty nine, hopefully that
you'll enjoy enjoy us for the National Inventor glus.

Speaker 2 (25:10):
What's on the twenty nine our.

Speaker 3 (25:12):
National Inventor Club meeting. Go into the app, go under
events and all the details are right there.

Speaker 2 (25:17):
All right.

Speaker 1 (25:18):
All right, thanks for.

Speaker 3 (25:19):
Being a part of episode in the Inventor Smart Community podcast.

Speaker 1 (25:24):
We really appreciate you being here, well done.

Speaker 3 (25:26):
Man's good stuff, all right, thank you, okay,