Regard (formerly known as HealthTensor), a software company developing an artificial intelligence (AI) co-pilot for physicians to help diagnose medical conditions, today announced it has raised $15.3 million in Series A funding. The financing was led by Calibrate Ventures and Foundry Group, with participation from existing investors TenOneTen Ventures and Susa Ventures, as well as new investors Brook Byers of Byers Capital and Drew Houston. The investment will be used to help grow the Regard team to support more clients, reduce integration time, and expedite reach to new physicians and hospitals, faster.
The funding comes at a critical time for the healthcare industry, with nearly 50% of physicians reporting being burnt out this year. The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated this issue, with 20% of the clinical workforce leaving the field from 2020 to 2021. Regard aims to help solve this problem by deploying its medical co-pilot. Designed to recognize approximately 50 of the most common medical conditions, the algorithm augments and automates patient medical records to ensure no condition is overlooked, thus saving physicians time with their note-writing process. Since its launch in 2020, Regard’s technology has been used on over 30,000 patients and has diagnosed over 420,000 medical conditions that otherwise would have been missed by providers.
“This round of funding underscores Regard’s mission to create technology that enriches and advances healthcare,” said Eli Ben-Joseph, co-founder and CEO of Regard. “Healthcare technology today often makes a physician’s job harder, not easier, and takes time away from patient care. We created Regard as a solution to enhance physicians’ workflows and enable them to focus on what matters most—providing the best available care and improving health outcomes. It’s exciting to know we’ve created a software doctor actually loves using and look forward to continuing this growth.”
Regard’s key differentiator is that it sits upstream of the patient visit, allowing physicians to easily access a patient’s medical background in one, user-friendly interface. Partnered with Epic and Cerner, two of the nation’s leading electronic medical record (EMR) providers, Regard’s proprietary algorithms aggregate and then mine the entirety of a patient’s medical history through their electronic health record (EHR). The aggregated data decreases room for error while optimizing the diagnostic and billing processes, resulting in overall improved quality of care and allowing for accurate hospital reimbursements.
Mark Laret, Regard’s newest Board member and former CEO of UCSF Health says, “Regard addresses two critically important issues in healthcare: it improves the accuracy of clinical documentation, while simultaneously reducing the workload of physicians. I expect this software will become ubiquitous within the healthcare system because providers and hospitals both want and need it.”
“We first invested in Regard in 2020 because we clearly saw the immense promise of its AI-driven technology to empower doctors to practice more patient-centered medicine, while saving time,” said Jason Schoettler, managing partner at Calibrate Ventures and Regard Board member. “Regard’s real magic is in the team. Co-founders Eli, Nate and Thomas have deep exposure to the medical and data science fields and they’ve assembled an incredible team of physicians, engineers, and company-builders laser-focused on one end goal: building the best AI software to help doctors improve patient care.”
