VitalTrax — the clinical software platform that connects patients to clinical trials — just hit another major milestone. On Wednesday, the startup announced that its clinical trial network Wing is now on the market. The network, the company’s first commercial product, includes a mobile app and online platform for listing trials and also recruiting and enrolling patients. Because the product makes health care more consumer friendly, it’s been dubbed the “OpenTable of clinical trials.”
VitalTrax’s development comes just months after it became the first company to tap into Philadelphia’s $6 million digital health funding initiative between Safeguard Scientifics, Ben Franklin Technology Partners, and Independence Blue Cross. VitalTrax, also a member of the University City Science Center’s ic@3401 community, nabbed $150,000 in seed funding from the initiative that isn’t even a year old.
What’s special about the startup is that it’s tackling the bureaucracy that often comes with signing patients up for clinical trials. The process is still manual in some cases and the difficulties can lead to low patient enrollment and engagement. Other innovation in the space has focused on the patient payment process or even helping patients travel to clinical trial sites.
VitalTrax’s cloud-based platform simplifies the process for participants on both sides. The online platform helps clinical trial teams better recruit patients and better engage them while a trial is active, the startup says. Patients can view more than 54,000 clinical trials through the app and even schedule a visit online or get site contact information.
“Wing meets a critical need for patients — to find and enroll in clinical trials — efficiently. This is a desperately unmet need in the industry and we’re looking to bridge the divide,” VitalTrax co-founder and CEP Zikria Syed said in a statement. “Think of the democratization OpenTable brings to the restaurant industry—that’s what we are doing for clinical trials.”
