HITLAB and the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) have unveiled the fourth class of the Digital Health Breakthrough Network, a New York City-based accelerator for early-stage startups.
The network is part of NYCEDC’s digital health portfolio. Its goal is to help startups pilot their solutions and strengthen their connection to the New York City technology and healthcare sectors.
Notably, women are leaders of all four organizations in the latest class.
Here’s a closer look at the companies:
Biotia provides hospital-acquired infection prevention powered by artificial intelligence. In addition to AI, it harnesses next-generation DNA sequencing to look at high-risk patients and prevent them from getting sick. Dr. Christopher Mason, Dr. Rachid Ounit and Dr. Niamh O’Hara co-founded Biotia. O’Hara currently serves as CEO.
KnowNOW is a telemedicine platform that provides testing and treatment for sexually transmitted diseases. More specifically, the company offers STD and HIV testing, diabetes testing, women’s sexual health services and PrEP. Its platform is HIPAA compliant. Dr. Diana Ramirez is a founding partner of KnowNOW.
A Deep-dive Into Specialty Pharma
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
OpticSurg wants to rethink how surgeons do their jobs. It has an augmented reality software tool to support surgical procedures. The goal is to minimize complications and better assist patients. Dr. Tran Tu Huynh, a surgeon and biomedical engineer, is the founder and CEO of OpticSurg.
Soundmind leverages the power of voice to help seniors. Through its various skills for voice assistants, older adults can listen to the news, set ret reminders and more. For instance, the company developed Memory Lane, a skill for Amazon’s Alexa that lets users listen to music and take a journey through time. Soundmind is led by CEO Erum Khan.
“We feel this cohort is a great reflection of the diversity of NYC as a whole, and also is a step in the right direction for increasing representation of women and minorities in the digital health and tech industry,” HITLAB deputy director Laura Pugliese said in a statement.
Founded in 2016, the Digital Health Breakthrough Network announced its third class of startups in December 2017. The companies in that cohort (Altopax, Navimize, PainQx and Tatch) focused on everything from teletherapy to sleep medicine.
Photo: phototechno, Getty Images
