The company, which provides AI-enabled services to simplify provider workflows, will use the funds to accelerate product development and increase market presence.
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AI startup Affineon Health, offers an AI-powered inbox that aims to simplify provider workflows and lessen administrative burdens, announced it raised $5 million in an oversubscribed funding round.
The round brings Affineon's total capital raised to $6 million.
GPG Ventures led the round with participation from existing investors, AI Fund and other new investors, including Deepwater, Benhamou Global Ventures (BGV), Headwater Ventures and Signal Peak Ventures.
WHAT IT DOES
Affineon Health automates routine lab results, prescription refills and patient communications that aims to reduce inbox volume. By integrating with EHR systems, providers may reclaim their time in Affineon's AI box without disrupting existing workflows.
"We're empowering healthcare providers by automating tedious tasks so they can spend more time on patient care and less on administrative work," David Norris, cofounder and CEO of Affineon Health, said in a statement.
"This oversubscribed round underscores how important solving this problem is and positions Affineon to scale our AI inbox to improve even more lives."
MARKET SNAPSHOT
In 2022, a study published in JAMA Network Open found that increased EHR use among primary care physicians was associated with improved patient A1c levels, hypertension control and breast cancer screening rates.
Researchers wrote: "Although increased EHR time is associated with burnout, it may represent a level of thoroughness or communication that enhances certain outcomes. It may be useful for future studies to characterize payment models, workflows and technologies that enable high-quality ambulatory care delivery while minimizing EHR burden."
When it comes to clinician burnout, several startups use technology to streamline medical documentation or other time-consuming tasks.
Think of AI ambient documentation platforms, such as healthcare software company Commure. In 2024, Commure acquired digital care navigation platform Memora Health. Commure provides a FHIR-compliant development platform for health systems, vendors and startups to build healthcare applications and software.
The company offers a suite of products, including Scribe, automatic clinical documentation powered by AI; Strongline, wearable duress badges that allow healthcare workers to call for and receive help; and RCM, financial operating systems for health practices and health systems.
Others include digital assistant Suki, which offers an AI-backed healthcare voice tool. In 2024, the company collaborated with Google Cloud to enhance its Suki Assistant tool using Google's Vertex AI platform. Google's Vertex AI is a search engine that allows organizations to build their own generative AI-enabled search engines. It gives companies the ability to search patient data, including clinical sources like FHIR data and clinical notes.
