Doccla, a provider of virtual ward and remote patient monitoring services, has secured £35 million ($38.6 million) in an oversubscribed Series B funding round.
The round was led by Lakestar, with participation from Elaia and existing investors General Catalyst (which led Dokla’s Series A round in 2022), SpeedInvest and Bertelsmann Investments (which co-led Dokla’s 2021 seed round along with Giant Ventures).
Oliver Heimes, a partner at Lakestar, will join Doccla’s board of directors.
What it does
Doccla offers virtual care and research services, including patient onboarding, compliance and clinical monitoring, and logistics management.
The London-based company plans to use the funds to expand its operations in the UK and Ireland by enabling patients to be discharged from hospital.
Dokra said in a statement that it has logged millions of patient days monitored across more than 10 European countries and recently signed a collaboration agreement with Ireland’s Health Service Executive (HSE).
The new funding will enable Doccia to grow across Europe, particularly in France and the DACH countries (Germany, Austria and Switzerland), while also expanding beyond Europe.
“Docura was founded to provide hospital-level care and support in the home to diverse patient profiles across the severity spectrum, enabling patients to be discharged from hospital sooner and helping patients with chronic care needs avoid hospitalization in the first place,” Docura founder Martin Latz said in a statement.
“Technology-enabled virtual wards offer huge benefits to patients, allowing them to recover at home while freeing up resources for healthcare providers. Our work has proven extremely valuable to the UK’s National Health Service and we are pleased to expand our operations in Europe. At the same time, we see exceptional growth potential for our offering in the life sciences sector and will continue to invest in our data science business.”
Market Snapshot
In 2022, Doccla supported the recovery of 100 cardiac patients who underwent ablation therapy at University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire (UHCW) NHS Trust.
UHCW NHS Trust and Doccla collected selected vital signs and symptom data from electrocardiograms (ECGs) of patients preparing for cardiac ablation procedures to treat atrial fibrillation (AFib).
In 2020, Doccla partnered with Northampton General Hospital NHS Trust (NGH) to trial remote smart patient monitoring aimed at freeing up capacity in the NHS.
Doccla provided a virtual ward built around the use of connected medical wearable devices in the home, allowing NGH clinicians to remotely monitor the vital signs of patients recovering from COVID-19 or with chronic conditions.
Other companies involved in remote patient monitoring include Honeywell Lifecare, which offers a remote health monitoring platform that digitizes and automates time-consuming and critical tasks during routine patient testing and care management.
Medtronic offers several remote patient monitoring products, including Medtronic CareLink, which helps diabetes patients manage their treatment, the MyCareLink Heart app, which can be used to automatically provide cardiac device information to healthcare providers, and the Medtronic-managed smartphone, which acts as a bedside monitor for patients who don’t have a compatible smart device.
Philips offers solutions for remote monitoring of patients with diabetes, hypertension and heart failure.
Clear Arch Health’s mobile application allows patients to self-monitor their vital signs. The product is a tablet-based interactive RPM system that combines the benefits of a personal emergency response system with RPM technology and remote life safety options.
ChronicCareIQ remotely monitors data on a color-coded dashboard, alerting staff if a patient’s condition worsens or symptoms appear.
The HIMSS AI in Healthcare Forum is scheduled to take place in Boston on September 5-6. More information and registration available here.
