Startup that uses smartphone camera for wound care brings in $35M

Swift Medical built an app that helps care providers improve wound care and brought in $35 million to scale up its technology.

The series B investment was led by Virgo Investment Group through one of its managed-investment funds, followed by existing investor, DCVC, who led their series A and BDC Capital’s Women-in-Tech Fund.

Other participating investors include leading health tech firms Claritas Capital, Chrysalis Ventures, Pender Ventures and Export Development Canada.

The company plans to use the fresh capital to scale its digital wound management platform across the care continuum in North America.

Swift Medical's technology is able to capture wound care information by waving the smartphone above the injured site in a “wand-like fashion.” It is also able to determine the depth of the injury. The technology captures wound images and measurements without the doctor or nurse having to touch the wound. And Swift Medical digitizes, tracks and automates the wound care management workflow.

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Patients with wounds frequently suffer from other, more eminent, conditions such as diabetes or hypertension, which conceal the severe impact of wounds. In the U.S., over 30% of all healthcare beds are occupied by patients with wounds, costing Medicare alone nearly $100 billion annually. Patients with wounds often experience chronic pain, loss of mobility, social isolation, depression, frequent hospitalization, amputation and even death.

“Wound care is a space that has been void of innovation for so long,” said Pooja Goel, managing director at Virgo in a statement. “A comprehensive approach to identification and treatment is needed to combat this silent epidemic. We are very excited and confident that Swift Medical’s wound engagement tool is going to transform the way patients heal across any care continuum, whether that be a hospital, skilled nursing facility or at home.

The company's technology is used by over 4,000 healthcare organizations to improve the prevention, treatment and management of wounds. As the digital health market has boomed, Swift Medical has grown rapidly, expanding 300% year-over-year in every new market it has entered over the past three years, according to Swift Medical.

“Wound care is a massive clinical and financial challenge at every bedside, which has been largely ignored by the technology industry,” said Carlo Perez, Co-Founder and CEO at Swift Medical. “Through COVID-19, health systems have been waking up to the need to equip their clinicians with empathic technology that gives them the knowledge and confidence to provide world-class wound care for even their most complex, bedridden patients.”

The Canadian startup, launched in 2015, has raised about $48 million in venture capital funding backed by Data Collective, Real Ventures and Relay Ventures.

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Raised by a father who was a trained engineer and a mother who worked as a nurse, Carlo Perez, co-founder and CEO at Swift Medical is an engineer by background who worked on novel applications of state-of-the-art visioning technology before co-founding Swift Medical. 

At a time when greater numbers of higher acuity patients are being discharged into the home, Swift Medical’s mobile app helps front-line clinicians provide standardized, best-practice care with high-precision wound images while providing centralized wound experts with visibility into population-wide wound data.

Traditionally, nurses and clinicians measure wounds with a paper measure, which contributes to high error rates. Swift Medical's technology measures wounds with 90% accuracy, the company said.

The company recently inked a partnership with AccentCare, the largest home health provider, to get its technology into the hands of thousands of care providers.

The partnership with AccentCare follows on the heels of Swift Medical's collaboration with home health software company Homecare Homebase to develop an integrated wound care solution.