An Iowa-based tech company, which specializes in using artificial intelligence to analyze lung CT images, recently raised $11 million in investor funding to help further its reach.
Vida Diagnostics said this round of financing comes by way of venture capital firm First Analysis, with Blue Heron Capital and UnityPoint Health Ventures also pitching in. Leaders plan to use this new cash infusion to intensify the rollout of its AI software that's aimed at helping rads interpret lung images more quickly.
“Pulmonology and radiology are severely underserved areas of healthcare—the need is expanding and the number of clinicians is limited,” Tracy Marshbanks, managing director and general partner at Chicago-based First Analysis said in a statement. “Vida is in an optimal position to deliver innovation and increase access.”
The partners noted that lung disease currently impacts 500 million individuals across the globe, and yet access to early treatment and care planning can be scarce. It aims to decrease physician burnout by speeding up the analysis of CT scans, patient data and other factors, with the former “particularly tedious to interpret due to the extensive and complex search field.”
Marty Stempniak has covered healthcare since 2012, with his byline appearing in the American Hospital Association's member magazine, Modern Healthcare and McKnight's. Prior to that, he wrote about village government and local business for his hometown newspaper in Oak Park, Illinois. He won a Peter Lisagor and Gold EXCEL awards in 2017 for his coverage of the opioid epidemic.