The most exciting medical frontier in the world right now is in the treatment of neuroimmune axis disorders—at least if you ask James Hemp, the chief scientific officer at Metrodora Institute.

Along with Fidji Simo and Laura Pace, Hemp co-founded Metrodora Institute, a new clinic in West Valley City focused on these disorders for which there is currently no cure.

Neuroimmune axis disorders are those that affect multiple body systems, such as the nervous, immune and gastrointestinal systems. According to a study published in the journal Gastroenterology, about 40 percent of over 70,000 survey respondents met the criteria for functional gastrointestinal disorders, products of “gut-brain interaction.”

Other neuroimmune axis disorders include long COVID, myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) and postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS). Take irritable bowel syndrome, for example. It may not seem like a problem that has much to do with the nervous or immune system, but it’s very connected, Pace and Hemp say.

“The vast majority of the effort of the immune system is protecting us from things that come through our GI tract,” Hemp says. “Because of that, that’s where most of that communication occurs between your immune system and your nervous system and actually controls the function of how our gastrointestinal tract actually works.

With limited treatment options and no cures, it’s a field that Metrodora is looking to make significant progress in through advanced, multidisciplinary care.

Pace, who also serves as CEO of the company, feels that through research, they can make scientific advancements more quickly for neuroimmune axis disorders, which she says has been a neglected medical space.

“Irritable bowel syndrome is one of those conditions where you actually have both the nervous system and the immune system impacted, but the name suggests that it’s just irritable and a little bit bothersome and not really impacting quality of life,” she says. “But the biology that we understand from basic sciences tells us this is a really significant condition, so it has a lot broader impacts than people think.”

Pace says that by the end of the year, Metrodora expects to have 160 staff members in West Valley City, a location picked in part for ease of access to the airport, cost savings compared to building on the coasts and local community partners in the area.

Since opening, Metrodora has received referrals from hospital systems across the country as well as the National Institutes of Health, Pace says, with “no shortage of patients” so far. 

Patients can self-refer unless they need a referral from a primary provider for insurance purposes. As of the end of May, they have one signed contract but are hoping to eventually take all insurance providers.

While that’s one problem Metrodora is working on, Hemp and Pace are excited about what they believe they can achieve in giving people with neuroimmune axis disorders their lives back.

“There has been incredible progress in the past couple of years, but we’re really decades behind other areas of research, and I think this is going to change dramatically,” Hemp says. “The next 10 years are literally going to be the decade of neuroimmune axis research, and it’s going to very likely lead to a significant amount of progress for understanding and also lead to a number of cures for these disorders.”