Israeli clinical analytics company Clew (formerly Intensix) is currently in the final stages of raising $20 million and has signed an agreement with Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer. Clew was founded by CEO Gal Salomon, a former partner at Pitango Venture Capital.
Clew has developed an analytics platform for predicting at an early stage, life threatening complications in intensive care. Salomon said, 'We are talking about patients who are in clear and immediate danger of their lives, whose lives are in the balance. A small push to the left or the right can seal their fate, whether they live or die."
Salomon's mother died in hospital from bedsores and he believes she could have had a different fate.
He added, "Today the medical approach is not to respond until you see a problem. But in intensive care, when you see signs of a problem, it's already too late in many instances."
Salomon observes that when a body is in distress, it gradually shuts down all systems that are not vital, in a process known as systems collapse. The aim is to protect the most vital systems, the brain and the heart, but the systems that collapse aren't always restored to full functioning and in all likelihood won't be restored. So if the patient reaches the stage, after the appearance of clinical indications, of systems collapse and the kidneys, pancreas, lungs and liver are not functioning, "these aren't really organs that the patient can live without." Sometimes the systems collapse could have been prevented if it was identified two or three hours ahead of time.
Your system really knows how to identify patients about to deteriorate, two or three hours before the doctors identify it?
"Yes, we see processes that when taking a quick glance at any moment in time seem normal but if you connect up an infinite number of points of data, you see a pattern of collapse. We collect the flow of data on blood pressure, oxygen levels in the blood, heart capacity."
Salomon says that data is collected from five channels and there are 700 pieces of information each minute.
Clew's product has already been used in trials at Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv and several US hospitals and will now also be used at Sheba Medical Center in Tel Hashomer. Marketing approval and regulatory matters must still be finalized, but Salomon hopes that the system will be available as a product from next year.
Clew has raised $10.5 million to date and as mentioned has almost raised another $20 million. The company has 27 employees in Netanya and three more in the US and hopes to double its workforce.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on October 22, 2018
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